Ghost Ride

After our Christmas dinner, my family went to the den to sit and tell stories. My dad mentioned the car we had when my brother and I were kids. It was dark blue. I remembered it as a hatchback, but my dad said no, it was a Ford Falcon. We called it the cream puff, a facetious nickname, because it broke down so often. If you pulled up the floor mat on the passenger side, you could watch the road speed by underneath through a small hole in the floorboard. We were not supposed to do that; we were not supposed to pull the mat up and look at the hole while the car was in motion, but sometimes it was irresistible.

I said what I remembered most about the cream puff was riding into town on Saturdays with our dad, listening to the Swap Shop on the radio. The Swap Shop was a local show. People called in and told what they had for sale or trade, and gave their phone numbers so listeners could call and arrange a time to go over and buy or trade for whatever it was they were selling. The sound of the Swap Shop was the sound of Saturday to me. After we ran our errands at the Big K or True Value, we would sometimes have lunch at Burger King, a delicious indulgence.

My brother said he remembered a time when he and our mother were driving home from town, happened on a car wreck beneath the overpass, and realized it was our dad and me in the cream puff.

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