Phil,
Great story. Brought a tear to my eyes. On a day of
sorrow, it was a great touch. Kiss your daughter from
all of us.
Jim
78B sold
70B Heritage body shell
2 kids, 2 dogs great wife and glad to be alive driving
an LBC
--- Phil Vanner <phil@outtech.com> wrote:
> For some time now, my Midget has been off the road
> for an extensive rebuild.
> Of course it is taking longer than expected, and I
> have developed a
> near-terminal case of "while I'm at it."
>
> So, I haven't had an LBC to drive for quite a while.
> This past Thursday, I
> got a call from my friend Jim. Saturday was "Wheels
> and Wings," the big car
> show/fly-in at Classic Motorbooks in Osceola
> Wisconsin. The whole town turns
> into a carnival for this event. He was unable to go
> because he had to be out
> of town. So, knowing that I didn't have a car to
> bring, and having a car he
> was trying to sell, he wondered if I would drive his
> Mini Cooper to the
> show, so it would get some exposure, and I'd have a
> car to drive.
>
> Yeah, he really had to twist my arm.
>
> I'd never seen this particular car, (Jim has a
> revolving garage door) so I
> walked over to his house to check it out and pick up
> the keys. There was a
> very clean, black Mini Cooper, 13 inch wheels, fuel
> injected, LHD. Very
> nice. I took it for a drive; tight as a drum. I
> immediately cleared my
> schedule for the day.
>
> Unfortunately my wife could not. So it was going to
> be Lily, my two year old
> daughter, and I. We strapped in the booster seat and
> right away she liked
> the fact that unlike mom's Volvo, she could see
> where we were going. She
> thought it was cute.
>
> 6:45 Saturday morning we were off. On the way,
> there's 25 minutes of boring
> suburb to drive through before we get to the fun
> roads north of St. Paul.
> I'm tooling along enjoying every minute when I spot
> a Traction Avant fueling
> up at a station on Hwy 96. I zip in to say hello and
> see if he's going to
> the show. Funny thing: when I ask if he's going to
> Osceola, he answers, by
> instinct, "It's a Citroen" before he realizes that's
> not what I asked. We
> both laughed. He must get that a lot. He was going
> to St. Paul to pick up a
> passenger before the show, so I headed off alone.
>
> Lily dozed off as I reach County Road 7, one of my
> favorites. With a willing
> little A-series pulling me through the curves,
> go-kart handling and an
> exhaust that has just enough of that anti-social
> buzz, I realized it has
> been WAY too long since I did this. The car ran
> perfectly. As we approached
> the St. Croix Trail, I saw an unmistakably vintage
> shape flash by, then
> another. When I reached the trail I fell in at the
> end of a line of
> classics, led by a trailered Isetta. Directly in
> front of me was a 55
> Chevrolet, then a pair of late 50's Corvettes, and
> assorted big American
> 50's rigs. Soon a late 50's Plymouth Belvedere fell
> in behind me. Then we
> passed a big Healey on another tributary, waiting
> for his turn to merge into
> the stream.
>
> Right from the start the show was great, lots of
> LBCs, and The Minnesota MG
> Group had coffee and doughnuts waiting for us. I was
> the first Mini there
> and was directed to a spot right at the entrance on
> a little hill where the
> organizers decided to put the Minis. As the rest of
> them showed up, I was
> between a wonderfully patinated dead-original '67
> MkII Cooper S (with John
> Cooper's signature in the boot) and a restored to
> better-than-new early
> non-S Cooper.
>
> We wandered the field, looked at many hundreds of
> cars of every sort, then
> Lily started to get bored at about noon. They were
> giving free train rides
> on old Great Northern passenger coaches so I took
> her for a short run. We
> had the entire train to ourselves. The engineer let
> Lily sound the whistle
> at a road crossing and ring the bell. She was
> grinning from ear to ear.
>
> Then we went for ice cream. I drove the car into
> town and stopped at a
> little sweets shop, and immediately drew a crowd. A
> few places over was a
> red Ferrari 328 that seemed to go unnoticed. (sorry
> Rick.) Lily patted the
> Minis flank and said "Papa's car." I had to remind
> her that it wasn't mine,
> and she asked when we had to give it back. "Not for
> a little while," I said.
> The rest of the afternoon was hers. We drove around
> town smiling, and she
> went on the carousel, rode a pony, visited the
> balloon vendor and petting
> zoo, and was generally spoiled by dad. We had an
> absolutely smashing time,
> me and my little girl, in that little car.
>
> On the way home she slept again and I took the long
> way, deliberately using
> some of the lesser traveled back roads. Just me, and
> the curves and the
> sweet little Cooper.
>
> I got home and carried my sleeping child to her
> bedroom. I came back in to
> tie her balloon to the bed frame so it would be
> there when she awoke. She
> opened her eyes briefly, looked up at the balloon
> and beamed. I kissed her
> and she looked at me and asked "We can't keep the
> little car?"
>
> I thought about the day we had and, well, Jim's car
> isn't for sale anymore.
>
> Phil Vanner
> Minneapolis
> '61 Midget
> and a four seat LBC
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