How I became a NASCAR fan part one; The Hubs
Posted: Saturday, March 07, 2009
by Nila Smith
Fact and Fiction
It began in 1992. It was early in the spring of that year that I learned that my dear hubby had been harboring a secret from me.
We had been together less than a year, although I had known and loved the man for well over three.
We were living in Carlyle Illinois , about 60 miles from St. Louis Missouri .
At that point in our lives hubs was a salesman of Livestock feeds, and I was Holly the Happy Homemaker.
This was one of those rare Saturdays, when he had left the house at 8, and returned a bit after noon.
I remember most of what I was doing when he got home; I was in the kitchen scrubbing something. After all that is what Happy Holly Homemaker does isn't it? She's always scrubbing something, striving for the epitome of cleanliness is her life's ambition.
When hubs came in the door, I stopped my scrubbing, and went through the routine questions, how did it go, did you make the sale, what was he like, so on so forth, as I quickly prepared a pair of iced teas, set the table, and laid out chips, cheese, meat, and other fixin's for a cold lunch, and then sat down at the table to take it all in as I knew was my "job".
And, hubs didn't disappoint. He gave me the details of the sales call, told me about the farm, the guy's house, his wife and kids, and so on and so forth.
Then he dropped the bomb. There was a stock car race track at little community two towns over, and they held races on Saturday nights.
In childhood, my grandparents had been keen fans of the horse races at the county fairs. We went every summer and watched the cart races and the jockeyed races.
My father brought to the family an additional interest in tractor pulling. He loved the pulls, and as I grew up, going to tractor pulls evolved into his building a garden tractor, and getting into the game himself. Even my mom became a "puller" and they both did very well at it with dozens of trophies sitting about the house as a testimony.
Car racing, though was something I didn't know much about, except to say that the Indianapolis 500 was on the TV every summer, and on one or two occasions, my dad tuned in the TV and attempted to watch it, but at that time, the Indy took well over 6 hours start to finish, and dad never in his life stayed in front of the TV for 6 hours at a time. He soon became bored with it, and would either change the channel, or turn the TV off all together.
Now, here sat my hubs, telling me about a stock car race he wanted to go to, and I was clueless. I felt the heat rising in my face, embarrassed by the fact that this was something I'd never heard of, I gently asked the question; "What is a stock car race".
Oh the look, the look on his face. It wasn't anger, but more something to the effect, of surprise and disappointment balled into one. I imagine it is the same look he would have given me had I asked him to shoot the family dog.
But, he patiently began explaining the stock car race to me beginning to end.
I heard about chassis, roll bars, sheet metal bodies, windows with no glass, and drivers who had to climb in through the windows because there weren't really any doors in the cars.
Those were the "modified" class. Then he told me about the bees" and the "bombers". Bees were four cylinder compact cars that got their nickname because they sounded like a swarm of bees racing around the track.
Bombers were real cars. Usually someone had an old car that they tuned up and kept in running condition, striving for ultimate speed. The racers built roll cages inside the existing bodies, welded the doors shut so they couldn't fly open, and of course, took a sledgehammer to all the glass.
He went on to explain the races themselves. There were hot laps, when the cars got out on the track and basically did some practice runs. Then depending on the track rules there were time trials, but then again some cars got their place on the track according to points".
Then there were heats. Heats were races with 8 to 12 cars, this depending on the size of the track. On a quarter mile dirt track, one couldn't line up 25 or 30 cars at a time because they wouldn't all fit.
Again depending on the rules of the track, the heats determined who went on to the feature. It could be just the heat winner, or it could be the first three or four placers. Again depending on the size of the track and the number of competitors, there could be multiple features, then one last ultimate feature.
Also, there were losers' features. Winners raced in one feature and losers raced in another. This part I really didn't understand because in my world, losers were losers, but I accepted the explanation.
When hubs was all finished explaining this to me, I asked yet another question, and the second family dog went to the wayside. "This is something you enjoy?"
"Well yes. I used to go to every race up home. I got to know the drivers, and it was really a lot of fun."
How could I have known this man since 1989 and never once heard him mention a stock car race? I was dumbfounded by it, and I just had to say so.
"I know I've told you about stock car racing and NASCAR, you have just forgotten it."
Well that irritated me. If I were nothing else in this world, I was certainly an attentive listener. I had excellent retention skills, and knew that I could recount to him every conversation we had ever had, and never, and I do mean never had there been any discussion about Stock car racing, and NASCAR. By the way, my mind was also rumbling about NASCAR. I was once again clueless, but at this point in time, I had no desire to open that can of worms.
With the irritation of his comment coming out in my voice, I said, "NO! You have never mentioned this, I would have remembered, I would have asked, and we would have already had this conversation!"
Of course, he sensed my frustration, and reflected it in his own voice when he almost shouted back; "What's the big deal anyway? It's a stupid race! It's not like as if I just told you I was the Uni-bomber or a freaking ax murderer!"
A bit calmer, he went on to remind me that there were plenty of things we still had to learn about each other. To site an example he reminded me that it wasn't until just this spring he had learned that I had a passion of trekking off to every garage sale in town on Friday evenings and Saturday mornings. Okay touch. I hadn't told him that because I thought he would think it was silly.
But, once I did tell him, I found out that it was something he also enjoyed, along with auctions and flea markets, both of which I had a fond passion for.
At this point, I really didn't think that I would be able to share his enthusiasm in watching a bunch of homemade car-like vehicles driving around in circles on a dirt track! But, I loved hubs, and I felt like it was my responsibility to at least give this stock car racing bit a shot. So, I smiled brightly and said: "You are right. I'm making a mountain out of a molehill. If there is a race tonight tonight, and it something you think we should go see, I think we should go too"!
We had eaten our lunch, but stayed at the table, sipping iced tea and skinning slices of lunchmeat off the stack one at a time, interspersed with chips. It was three thirty or so, and hubs said we needed to be on our way by ten till 4 as we needed to stop and get gas.
I surmised that at the stage in the game, there was no need to worry about what we'd be eating for dinner. With the stack of lunchmeat nearly all gone, it was possible that we'd both eaten all we needed for one day anyway.
Besides if stock car races were anything at all like the horse races at the fair there would be plenty of Hawkers there selling tiny grease soaked burgers, chili dogs and lemon shake-ups.
As I headed to the bedroom to change, I asked what one wears to a stock car race. My hub's only answer was "Don't wear white". Again, I was clueless, but with the family cat in serious jeopardy, I held my tongue and followed orders.
Twenty minutes later I came out of the bathroom with denim jeans, a jungle print cotton blouse, little huarache sandals on, and my hair neatly done in a french braid with the tail hanging down my back.
"How do I look?" I smiled, pleased that I had made no attempt to defy the "white" ban. He smiled sweetly, glanced down at my cute little huarache's and chuckled ever so slightly, then assured me that I looked like a real race car fan.
Somehow, I knew he wasn't being totally honest with me, but at this stage in the game, I was just happy to know that the balance of our family pets would live to see another day!
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Top-level comments on this article: (2 total)Dear Nila,Very interestingly written article. Keep writting. You held my attention till the end.SwapnaThank you for your kind words.The original piece was sooooo long, I had to break it into parts, and was afraid no one would bother with it.Please be sure to check back and read parts two and three as both have now been submitted.Thanks again!
Nila,I read Part II first, now Part I and will follow with Part III.I really, really enjoyed this! Great writing. You know how to hold one's interest and I can't wait to see what happens in Part III.Thanks for sharing,NancyThank-you Nancy for more kind words.
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