Personal Essay: A Fictional Narrative

"There's one condition," he said.

I wasn't surprised; there's always a condition when life offers opportunity years ahead of its time.

"I'll teach ya ta drive my 47' Pontiac, but ya don't need ta explain it to your mom or say nothin' ta my wife if ya get my drift." Then he smiled and gave me a double wink, as well as a man with one eye could wink. Walking away, he turned back and added, almost as an afterthought, "From now on, when ya mow the grass on Saturdays, I want ya ta get er done early then ride your bike over to my place."

And, just like that, I was both signed up for clandestine driving instruction and became his indentured servant. That summer, the summer I was thirteen, my friend, Doug the Deacon, taught me to drive his magnificent

Doug needed my help. He could no longer see well enough to drive himself to the tavern where he played poker with the mayor, the sheriff, and his friend Bill, who owned the tavern. It was a game he'd rather not have to explain to his wife.

So, Saturday mornings after mowing the lawn, I rode the Cushman scooter seven blocks to Doug's house and waved to the Sheriff going in the opposite direction on his way to the card game. Small towns had their advantages; practical solutions sometimes won out over inconvenient laws. When I arrived at Doug's, I traded the scooter for a stack of cushions on the front seat of the Pontiac. The extra height allowed me to see through the spokes of the giant steering wheel for, as Doug explained to his wife, a driving lesson.

I stood on a short stool so I could lean over the table the way I watched the old guys do. Like them, I gripped the polished leather of the table edge with my left hand and squinted with one eye closed. I held my mouth just so and screwed my face up in earnest concentration with my gaze focused at the far end of the table. Slowly, I slid the puck back and forth a couple times to get a feel for the table's friction, one... two... three...release. The puck whispered a sensuous sssssssssssss as it effortlessly glided down the table, trailing a faint blue wake of disturbed smoky air behind. Click! If I was lucky it would bump the other guy's puck over the end of the table and into the gutter. I usually played a solitary game, shooting for both myself and the "other