MUSHY'S MOOCHINGS: THE OLD GREEN BOMB

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

THE OLD GREEN BOMB

Woody was my first new friend in Harriman. We did not meet until after our junior year began. His dad owned a great little nursery across the highway from where we parked our trailer. Later, I got work at the nursery, very hard work that involved a shovel, a mattock, and “other implements of destruction” most days. The only worthwhile part of it, besides the $5 or so I made a week, was working a long side of Woody.

He was my age, very skinny, very fickle, undependable, and never seemed to buy his own cigarettes, but he and I connected on many levels. We both had a great work ethic and we loved music, cigarettes, guns, girls, and beer.

Woody was a philosopher of sorts, and contemplated the deeper things of life. He often quoted phrases and ideas from Khalil Gibran’s “The Prophet,” a collection of essays about the human condition.

Woody made the author’s view of love, marriage, eating and drinking, work, joy and sorrow, crime and punishment, laws, freedom, pain, friendship, time, good and evil, prayer, pleasure, religion, and death, among other things his own. By the end of that first year at the nursery, Woody had related almost every word of the book.

We talked endlessly, with me doing more of the listening, but even after work we would sit somewhere, puff cigarettes, and discuss countless things. He was Church of Christ and I was raised Baptist, so religion was often a topic which always ended in an argument. We finally learned to avoid the topic. It seems sometimes, that religion is good for nothing else.

Our favorite place to talk was in the “Green Bomb” which was his dad’s ’48 Chevy pickup. It was a classic with a strong straight six, three-on-the-tree, and it would run forever on $2 of gas – of course that was about eight gallons back then!

The only flaw in the “Green Bomb” was the passenger door that would suddenly swing open in the middle of a curve, but after the first time you learned to anticipated it. Many were the times I would swing out on that door with a hoot and a holler, banging on the outside panel, and swing back up in the seat as the road straightened out! The ease with which it opened came in handy when you wanted to “roll” a big dog!

We did not get permission to take her out as much as we liked, but we made up for it by stealing it! The truck was always parked on a hill and if you released the parking brake and pushed in the clutch it would quietly roll off and over the next hill. Woody would then turn the key, put it in second gear, pop the clutch, and we were off!

Once Woody’s mom and dad settled into watching TV in the living room, they rarely moved. So, on the return trip we simply doused the lights, killed the engine, and rolled the “Green Bomb” silently into its former position and stopped. I remember one night, just as we stopped; Woody’s dad came around the corner, from the back of the house and just said, “Howdy boys.”

We sucked in a breath of air and “howdied” him back, waiting for a lecture. As it turned out, he never knew what we had the truck out, just went on into the house.

Woody even dated in that old truck from time to time, which reminds me of a saying his brother-in-law had about girls that would date a guy in a truck! “If you can truck’em, you can _ _ _ _’em!” Believe me, that old adage was put to the test!

I loved that old truck and when I think back to my high school days, this truck stands out as that time’s icon. It was not a beauty, never turned girl’s heads, but took us everywhere we wanted and should not have gone. I can smell the musty dusty cab now, and feel my hand slam the glove compartment shut again for the tenth time on every trip.

Once we took it upon ourselves to teach Wayne, another friend, to drive a straight-shift. He did fine until he failed to negotiate a sharp curve and took out about six mailboxes! There was not a scratch on that old truck – they don’t mak’em like that anymore!

I bet, if I look outside just now, I can see ol’ Woody pulling up in the ol’ “Green Bomb” looking to bum a Winston.

20 comments:

Les Becker said...

As always, you write so "real" I was there with you. What a hoot getting "almost" caught like that - truth really is stranger than fiction sometimes. I like your life, Mushy.

FHB said...

Another great post. Buddy of mine had an old truck like that he called the grey ghost, from all the grey primer on it. Solid steel. Sold it a while back and still misses it. Ever hear from that guy now, or know what ever happened to him?

fuzzbert_1999@yahoo.com said...

Like I said, he was fickle...he would start a job and then just not go back. He would decide he wanted to be a lawyer, buy the class ring, then change majors. He would buy things and then sell them cheap for the money...I always had an expensive watch I bought from him for nothing.

He once came by my house and kept giving his 4 year old beer as we talked. The little devil was looped by the time they left.

He got stranger and stranger as the years passed. If I was the Secret Service, I'd lock him up if the pres came anywhere around these parts!

Oh yeah...that last time he came, he bummed cigarettes!

Suldog said...

I can almost smell the interior of that truck - not that that's necessarily a good thing...

BRUNO said...

Damn! Read your mail, and you'll have my response "ready-wrote" for this entry!

Shrink Wrapped Scream said...

You've done it again, mushy, got me riding right on up there beside you (and no - you can't truck me..).

Every one knew a Woody (hell, I STILL have a copy of The Prophet)!

Lovely reading, my friend - thank you.

BRUNO said...

Would be quite an experience, with Shrink here along! Unless I'm way-off base again, our passenger side would be her traffic side. Talk about a rude awakening! But then again, it probably still wouldn't scratch the paint, just smudge it up a little, due to "naturally-occurring bodily-responses".....!(It wasn't supposed to make sense, just showin' you I had to re-read it a couple times more, myself!)

Alex said...

I would pay big bucks for a new truck if they started making threes on the tree again!

The closest I've come is the summer after high school, when I worked for the parks service. We drove around old Kushmans with the weightlifter-approved manual transmission system.

Anonymous said...

I love those old 'round' trucks. My brother got a 1951 Chevy that had been redone just like knew. Wow, that thing was pretty ... and expensive.

What great memories you have, thanks for sharing.

Shrink Wrapped Scream said...

Oi, Bruno - I heard that!

*Goddess* said...

"If you can truck 'em you can ---- 'em".....are we THAT easy?! LOL....I'm thinking we probably are;)

Jose said...

Ahh, to be a teenager again! Those were the days.

Michele said...

I'm hoping I've solved the problem with blogger and comments!! Love the pics; hopefully it will get warm enough in my neck of the woods sometime soon so I can get some good ones!

a faith bigger than fear said...

All your reminiscing makes me think of my "Lemon Yello Plymouth Belvedere" that I owned in High School! No one could ever mistake me coming down the freakin' road!! I loved my '67 Plymouth Belvedere... ahhh the memories that flood back to mind!!!

Love the "Green Bomb"!!!

Miss Trashahassee said...

Y'all shoulda gotten your heinies whupped for bein' so rambunctshus.

Urp.

BFF,
Miss T

fuzzbert_1999@yahoo.com said...

Thanks for sharing your memories too!

phlegmfatale said...

I had a girlfriend in high school who had an ancient Green Bomb that looked just like that one. Circa 1984 found us on summer evenings rolling down the road, windows rolled down, howling "Stand by your man" and other such things. Good stuff.

Imagesmith said...

My, my, that took me back to the time when my buddies and I "borrowed" the family's 53 Plymouth. We ran out of gas in Turkey Creek, Ky. around 2am. In that day there were no gas stations open at that hour & our only hope was to find a house. We must have pushed that monster of a car 10 miles. Bitching, pissing, moaning, groaning, laughing, smoking Viceroy's, and sweating. It was a great night and the best of it was we managed to syphon some gas and get it back in it's resting place with no worse for wear. The bad part was I got home in time to change and go to work at Piggly Wiggly for .75 cents an hour.......dang I hated that job.

fuzzbert_1999@yahoo.com said...

Phlegmfatale and Tom - Wow, great memories too. Thanks for sharing!

Becky said...

I was always too scared to sneak out and take a car when I was a teenager, though my sibs did it many times. I'm still in shock that anything could run forever on only eight gallons of gas!