The driver and his Ghia had cruised through the hills at the eastern edge of the central Coast Range several times a week for the past seven years. But now they had cruised their last.
The beautiful licorice jellybean car had somehow developed a fatal gas leak in traffic, and had gone up in flames at a stoplight somewhere in the middle of greater San Jose. A passerby dedicated his jacket to the desperate cause of beating back the flames that darted and flickered from the air intake grill in the top of the engine lid. Then a police officer expended his tiny fire extinguisher into the grill while waiting for the fire department to arrive.
By the time two engine companies arrived on the scene and casually rolled out their hoses, the entire engine compartment was fully involved in roaring flames. Burning gas dripped in a puddle under the car. Finally the fire crew sprang into action. When they had finished, everything consumable in the rear part of the car was gone. Hoses, belts, electrical insulation, plastic parts, battery casing, and aluminum carburetor were all reduced to a crumbling mass of charred and melted rubbish. The engine lid was warped and devoid of paint and primer. Brake lines were burned through, but remarkably, all the tires were still standing.
The Ghia was dead. It was dead in the way of old Volkswagens. Out of commission but still recognizable; still able to receive parts transplants from even less fortunate Bugs and Ghias that had sustained irreparable collision damage. It would live again in the fond care of some kid looking for a project to transform by a labor of love into a first car. But for this driver, it was dead. The midlife crisis that had spurred him on to buy it was fading fast, and the joy of working incessantly to keep an antique car running had finally begun to fade.
He would find a young savior to resurrect the Ghia. But in the mean time, he would buy a Honda.
2 comments:
It was charitable of you not to mention that I was behind the wheel when the fire started.
I sometimes wonder if this scenario would have played out differently if you had taken the Ghia that day instead of me. I'm two for two so far on burning up Volkswagons...
Probably not. It's not easy to alter the progress of a gasoline fire once it gets started. I did douse an engine fire on that car once, but it was burning oil that had leaked onto the manifold rather than gasoline. What might have altered the course would have been for me to notice the condition of the fuel line before hand.
I hope you don't feel responsible for this. You weren't.
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