Muscle Car Clock

 

Car Barn... 66 GTO and 62 Impala

      

The clock in the kitchen is making a funny noise. I wrack my brain trying to remember which engine is revving. It must be the 69 Plymouth Roadrunner with the 383 engine in it. There is a throaty choke, and the clock revs aggressively and zooms off into the ten o'clock hour. In an hour, my favorite car, the Pontiac GTO will be revving its engine to tell me the hour is up. Every sixty minutes, a different muscle car will growl to life through a tiny speaker in the heart of the clock, scaring the bejesus out of the house cat and reminding whoever is nearby that time passes us by. 

I used to know all the cars on the Muscle Car clock by heart. It is an old analog clock that I got when I was nine or ten years old and obsessed with Camaros and Chevelles. Recently, while searching for some old paperwork in the attic, I spooked like Captain Hook in Peter Pan when I heard a strange ticking sound emanating from a box in the corner. The clock had been idle with drained batteries for at least a decade and then suddenly started ticking again. Overcome with nostalgia, I immediately unearthed it and hung it up in the kitchen.

Shaped like a steering wheel with racing stripes, the clock has the picture and engine noise of different muscle cars for each hour of the day. Back when this clock first hung on my wall, I could tell the time and the car just from the engine noise. This was the era of my childhood when I could spot a headlight peeking out around the corner of a barn and could list off the model of car, year and probable engine size. My bookshelf was a collection of auto parts manuals and hot rod magazines. Hot Wheels were a currency for all transactions and going to the mechanics shop was like going to church. For a brief year or so, all I cared about were the engine specs and paint jobs of that special era of cars made in the mid 60’s to early 70’s. 

When unsupervised, I would go out to Dad’s barn and slide the tarp off the 66 Pontiac GTO convertible that had been in hibernation since a mouse had chewed out the electrical wires. Too young to drive and too poor to restore the car to its former glory, I would dream of the day I could cruise the cherry red Goat down Main Street on a summer evening. Even twenty three years later, every time I visit my parents, I still slide the tarp back and sneak a peek at a restoration dream that has yet to come true. 

Despite my love for all things muscle cars, my interest never translated into mechanical ability. Sure, I can do basic maintenance on my truck. When necessary, I have replaced the brakes and shocks. I have learned the hard way how to bend body panels back into place or reattach bumpers after deer collisions. But most of the time, I stare into the engine compartment with a combination of awe and bafflement as the whizzing and the whirring parts of a modern engine. There are hoses going every which way, wires and tubes disappearing into the depths and plastic covers covering all the interesting bits. 21st century trucks are significantly different from staring into the open maw of a 69 Fastback or Barracuda. 

Over the years, the muscle car phase got replaced by the tree fort phase, then the Lego phase or college football or one of a thousand phases that a kid goes through. There is never enough time in a day or a lifetime to follow through on all the interesting things in life. Now more than ever, surrounded by technology that didn’t exist when I was kid, it is easy to get sidetracked by the internet rabbit hole or paying the never ending pile of bills. But the Muscle Car clock hanging over the kitchen sink is an audible reminder that time is always ticking. So, in a couple minutes, when that 67 GTO fires up, I am going to put on my oil stained FSU Seminoles hoodie, grab my old metal toolbox and start with the basics, an oil change on the Tacoma. Then, if that goes well, I will tap into my old muscle car obsession and get serious about restoring the GTO in the barn.