There is something nice about the country. The way the clack of a door is heard across a green field of corn in the morning. The smell of the early rose and the spring lilac, as the workday humidity poorly disguises afternoon's swelter. The white cotton shirts hanging against an unimpeded horizon. The dense calm that comes from a hard day's work.
Country road
Nettie had become weary of the whole thing. Having lived, and gone to school, in the big city. It was a nice change at first, soon losing its luster as the days seemed to fold into seasons and years. There was a sense of the earth's orbit, as she lay on her front lawn on Thursday mornings. There was a sense of cycle, a sense of captivity.
So, after lying in thought, reality's moisture would seep through her white-floral-cotton dress, whilst the red ants, drawn by her white rose perfume, raised her to a utilitarian sense of foot and ground and purpose.
1974 Buick LeSabre
She heard her husband Will plowing the back forty acres; his Allis Chalmers puttering through the song of the cardinals, and waved habitually at the tiny orange speck in the distant field. It was time to go to town.
Will had bought her a new Buick that spring. She adored the car, and kept it sparkly clean. She loved the velour seats, the soft ride, and the way the 350 V-8 gave her a sturdy shove when she wanted to overtake or just have fun.
After slowly driving down the long gravel driveway from their farm, she took a left onto the county road to town, driving past the Williams farm on the right, then taking the highway in.
Tommy Williams' big-block Camaro
The Williams family were the types that always had the biggest. The biggest house, the biggest barn, the biggest biggest. Their son Tommy was no exception to the precedent, squealing his big-block Camaro through the quiet night, taunting overall-adorned farmers in the day.
Some summer mornings he would sit, waiting for Nettie, and as she approached, lurch before her...slowing down. As she tried to pass, he would floor his Camaro, leaving Nettie in a waft of dust, and taunting wave.
This would not do, and it gave Nettie fuel for thought, as she lay supine in the grass. Having a degree in mechanical engineering, and having helped her father repair all things motorized as a girl, she knew her way around a wrench and had a superb knowledge of internal combustion, preferring journals of Hot Rod and Popular Mechanics, to Redbook or Woman's Home Journal.
So, on a day in Mid-June, she passed on the grass and backed the Buick into the pole-barn, having received a parcel in the mail the day before. She had explained to Will that it was a new ironing press. He had no idea that it was a bottle of nitrous.
After tearing the pile carpet from the trunk, she welded a brace for the bottle, drilling vent holes near the right-side exhaust to improve bottle temperatures, she piped the braided hoses, using ties to support them against the frame...Gone was the Rochester, a new Holley 750 cfm sat upon a boost plate. The jets were bigger, the boost was installed.
It was just another day of terrorizing the countryside for Tommy when Nettie drove by that day. As usual Tommy pulled in front of her, spitting gravel on her pristine chrome grille, then slowed down for her to pass. As she got even to his front bumper she heard the tribal cry of his big-block and hit the button. The Buick's right-rear wheel ignited into a storm cloud of rubber, as the speedo swung, like a tree swing in a tornado, past a buck ten. And as she passed she saw his huge eyes, his slack jaw, and his redneck sweating in the morning hue, as he became small in the mirror, near a field of cardinals.
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Comments (5)
Love the redneck sweat Mark!
Thanks!
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Great read
Thank you Brian.