[DonDavis]

Many of you remember I had a fairly sweet '72 that I swapped in a 3.2 and then tracked that car quite a bit. It was ridiculously fun.

When my son was 9, he goofing around in the garage with a neighborhood kid and they knocked over a bicycle that brushed the driver's door causing a very small 1.5" tiny, barely visible scratch.

He came in right away to let me know.

I walked out just knowing it was going to be bad. I could feel myself tingling, and memories of my Dad ripping me as a kid for stupid siht was making it worse.

When I saw it was nothing of course I was relieved.

Here's the hard part...when I looked at my son he looked terrified. I was crushed. I hugged him, laughed and told him it was nothing and praised him for telling me right away.

They left the garage and played outside. I went inside and almost cried seeing him so scared.

I listed my car for sale the next week.

Then, about 8-9 months later, longhood prices went nuts.

Sure, that stung, but...it was just a car to me.

Since then, we've gotten into cheap ass Subarus that are awesome and he now has an '02 Toyota Solara that he loves and tweaks. He thanks me all the time for steering him away from car payments. There are endless sweet cars to be had for $10k and less.

I'll probably get a 997.2 when I retire next year and have no real desire to own another longhood. But gawd, they are purty.