Velociworld

A Ride in the Ranchero

When we moved to the semi-fecund acreage we called a farm when I was nine, we kids met a new breed of character. Here is an instance:

My father employed a fellow named James to do dick-all work around the farm. A slow leaker, he, but he knew how to entertain kids. We'd pile in the back of the '66 Ranchero and he would take us to the feed store, the abattoir, the black part of Guyton, where I suppose he was auditing income tax returns. He liked to fishtail on dirt roads, speed outrageously, and do 180's with the handbrake, slinging us around pretty hard. The kind of ass-puckering ride boys love. And it beat the hell out of pulling peanuts out of the ground.

James wore out his welcome after a while, though. My mother was incensed when he put a bare naked lady license plate on the front of our Ranchero, which we allowed him to use as a semi-personal vehicle, and he angered the Senator when he directed one too many cracked-tooth grins at my sisters.

Saw him a few years after we sold the farm when he delivered a Sears refrigerator to our river house in Montgomery. He was still a veritable loser.

In retrospect I certainly understand why my parents ran him off, but I missed those Ranchero rides.