It's KPC Again

When I was a teenager in Tyler, Texas, we “dragged Broadway.” That means we drove that straight stretch of four-lane street again and again at night. We started downtown at the Square and drove all the way out to Loop 323. That’s about four miles. We could do it for hours, considering that we would stop at various places along the way. A city park, the parking lot of a closed business, a hamburger shop. You get the picture.

In middle school, a neighborhood friend, Dale, and I came up with a plan for dragging Broadway without any big kid’s help. Dale would drive his dad’s Thunderbird while his parents were away one night. How Dale worked it out is complicated, but the short version is he had access to the Thunderbird. And, that meant I had access. You might call it our version of “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.” This was long before that movie ever appeared.

I had just finished 7^th Grade. Dale was a year older. Neither of us were big fellows. We were average-sized middle schoolers. Not tall, not short for our ages. And, we were definitely on the thin side. It is highly unlikely anyone would have ever mistaken us for high school boys. But, that did not concern us, at all. We had a night out on the town planned. In a car.

In the days leading up to our adventure, Dale started paying attention to the driver’s seat in the Thunderbird.  Dale quickly realized he could not see over the steering wheel very well. So, he decided that he would set some pillows on the seat to help him get a better view. That was an easy problem to solve.

I am not sure if I ever asked Dale if he could drive. If you knew Dale, you would understand. He was a confident dude. If he said he could do something, you just knew he could.  

So, on a hot summer night, a Saturday night, we took off. I told my mother and stepfather that I was hanging out at Dale’s. So, we were cleared for takeoff.

While I rode “shotgun,” Dale pulled slowly away from his parent’s home.  We were several miles from Broadway, about half-way across our small city, so we cruised along many streets making our way toward downtown Tyler. Anxious to get on our way, we left well before dark. With the radio playing and the windows down low, life was good.

Once we reached Broadway, we started dragging up and down the street. Just like the big kids. I have no idea if anyone noticed that we looked awfully young to be in a car on our own. We had our first big scare while stopped at a stoplight in front of Bergfeld Park. A police car pulled up behind us. Dale stayed calm, sat up straight, and strained to look over that steering wheel. The police apparently paid no attention to us, fortunately.  And, we drove on and on.

After we had our fill of Broadway, Dale turned the Thunderbird toward home.  When we arrived, he parked it precisely where his dad last parked it. We felt great. We had pulled it off.

Then, Dale decided that we needed to figure out how to erase some miles from the odometer. We gave it some thought, realized we knew nothing about such things and let it go.

The good news is Dale’s parents never realized the car had ever left its parking spot. And, I made my way home without my mom and stepdad having any concerns, either. 

In the years ahead, I dragged Broadway countless times with friends and on my own. I had a license to drive by then and all went well. Dale and I never took the Thunderbird out again. Maybe, we did not want to risk failure. We made a plan, we carried it out, we succeeded. We had a great story to tell, but we could not tell it.  Well, I just did.

My brother, David, sent me a photo of a 1949-50 Frazer automobile, recently. He included this note: “This is the car Mother was driving when you fell out.” It was not the actual car, of course, but a photo of one like our mom was driving.

I am guessing not many people can recount the story of when they fell out of a car. If you cannot, do not feel badly about it. I cannot recommend the experience.

I hit the road one morning in Texarkana. I am guessing we were in Texarkana, Texas, not Texarkana, Arkansas. There’s not much that separates the two small cities other than a stripe down the middle of State Line Avenue.

Mother was driving us to school one morning in that Frazer. I do not remember exactly what grade I was in. Early elementary is the best I can do. I started school in 1960 at Sacred Heart Academy in Texarkana. Texas. First grade. Kindergarten had not caught on there, apparently.

As my mother took a sharp turn maybe a little too fast in the Frazer, the front passenger door fell open and I fell out. I had been sitting in the front seat with no seat belt. Those things were years away from appearing in cars. I wish the company that built Frazers had looked ahead to the possibility that a little dude might roll out of one of their cars someday. Oh, well.

I still remember skidding across the asphalt pavement. After maybe 60 years, I still remember that it hurt. I was fortunate.  No car ran over me and I came out of it with scratches and bruises. My pants were torn a little, which bothered me. I was particular about my clothing and I was distressed to see the damage. I do not remember crying. 

My mother quickly stopped, of course, checked me out and put me back in the car. She decided not to drop me off at school. I mean, I had already been dropped off in a way.

I ended up spending the day taking it easy. At every opportunity, I told people about my adventure. And, here I am now still talking about it.

My fall might account for why I am a slow poke driver. Maybe I am afraid of falling out of my car. All I know is I can drive from here to Texas and never fall out. Not even once. I also refuse to buy a Frazer automobile (the company shut down in 1953).

A year and a half ago, I retired from an employer that has been a big part of my life for most of my life. With family and friends, Candace and I celebrated my retirement (thanks Zoom) from Wake Forest University as a new academic year was starting without me for the first time in 30 years.

The pandemic had already started, so I had been working from home for months at that time. Due to the pandemic, l stayed off campus and out of the way in the months that followed my retirement. My Wake Forest colleagues were doing an outstanding job without me, but I admit that some days I wished I could help them navigate the pandemic. 

Since my retirement from Wake Forest, I have not been on campus, often. When I have been there, it has usually been on a weekend or holiday. Essentially, it has been when campus was somewhat quiet, mostly.  

I have met with Wake Forest friends on several occasions, but routinely off campus at a restaurant or brewery or elsewhere. Recently, I met a great friend on campus for lunch at a dining area well familiar to me. My former colleague and I met first at the building where I worked for a long time, then we walked to another nearby building for lunch. Afterward, I walked alone around campus a while. It was a busy day on campus, with classes underway and staff and faculty busy in offices and other spaces everywhere.

Here’s what I found. I felt like a retiree. And an alumnus. And a parent. I did not feel like a staff member. And that was okay.

I walked past places where people I had known were no longer working. Some had retired, as I have. Some had moved on to other jobs. Students I had known were nowhere to be found. They are alumni now and I am proud of them.

I tell people that I know every square inch of that gorgeous campus. I have walked through every building. I have run and walked all over campus thousands of times. That goes all the way back to when I was a full-time graduate student starting in the late 1970s.

When I walk on campus, I see ghosts, in a way. I am walking with graduate school professors who taught me as much out of class as in class. Their precious words remain as precious memories, especially now that they have passed on. I thank God for every one of them.

Professors, staff and students I came to know during my Wake Forest career remain with me, too. I can look up to a window in a building and remember the early morning meetings where my colleagues and I gathered to address a critical situation affecting our university community. I remember walking along sidewalks with students who wanted to talk with me about something that was of concern to them. Today, some of those young folks are middle-aged parents with children in college.  

Among my happiest times at Wake Forest was when my son and daughter were students there. I would walk across Hearn Plaza and look up to the windows of the rooms where they lived. I could hardly believe that I, a man who had grown up in some hard circumstances at times, had children studying at one of our nation’s finest universities. Today, my daughter is an adjunct faculty member. 

I gained many fine friends through the years at Wake Forest. One, a world-renowned professor, passed away in December. We had planned to keep meeting on campus for lunch for years to come. Despite the pandemic, we occasionally met off campus for lunch and catching up, in addition to our regular texts, phone calls and emails. I am not ready, yet, to go near his former office or our favorite on-campus lunch spot. I have wonderful memories of our friendship that I call on, frequently.

I have wandered around in explaining all of this, as I wandered about campus, recently. The short story is I am okay as Graduate School alumnus, university retiree and Wake Forest parent.  I am more than okay.

 I feel at peace. Others are taking care of Wake Forest these days. Now, I feel like I did a long time ago when I had finished my master’s in English and was working a newspaper job I loved. I had moved on back then. And I have moved on now at another stage in my life.    

“One more time.” Anytime my grandson Archer wants to keep doing something, that is what he exclaims. His older brother, Owen, keeps it simpler. “More.” 

If it is time to leave the park or walk away from their toys outside and go inside for a meal, there is a good chance they will make those statements. When they bring up previous visits to an airport or a fire station, it is the same.

Sometimes, especially when I am relaxing in the evening and listening to music, I reflect on experiences in my past and say the same in my mind. “One More Time.” And, “More.”

I believe many of us think the same. There are past experiences we want to do again. And, like the boys, we really would like to do it again much more than one more time.

Here is a partial list of experiences I want to do again:

–Run with high school friends after school along roads surrounded by pretty neighborhoods, woods and fields.

–Tag along with my grandfather as he drove his pickup from town to town delivering tires to gas stations and ranches in East Texas, while I sat next to him with the Bazooka gum, Three Musketeers bars and Dr. Pepper drinks he bought me.

–Walk into the little house where my family lived throughout my teens and find my mother sitting in her favorite chair, where she often sat quietly alone at night smoking a cigarette. 

–Attend a literature class in high school where a favorite teacher in my senior year introduced me to the writings of William Faulkner and devoted much of his own time to sparking an intellectual passion that stayed with me through graduate school and well beyond.

–Work alongside my stepfather at his auto paint and body shop, where I learned to do every little thing the right way and feel good about my work.

–Go on bike rides and walks with my wife, Candace, around our college campus and the little Texas town where it was located.

–With Candace, take our toddlers Tyler and Cassie to Wrightsville Beach where they loved to play.

–With Candace and our children, attend a minor league baseball game where they asked for autographs and tried to grab foul balls.

–Leave Wake Forest’s campus on a five-mile run or my home on a seven-mile run.

–Meet one of my greatest-ever friends for lunch and talk about whatever is on our minds.

Naturally, time has passed. People have passed, in some cases. I can only replay these experiences in my mind. 

Fortunately, I still have opportunities for many new memorable experiences with my family and friends. That is where I devote my time and energies. But, I cannot help but wish, sometimes.

I first met my grandson Owen eight weeks after he arrived in this world. And, on the same day that he arrived in the lives of my daughter, Cassie, and her husband, Nick. 

Owen came into their lives as a little fellow needing a home where he would receive loving care. Cassie and Nick were his foster parents. Candace and I were excited to meet him. We both remember seeing him that first time when Cassie and Nick brought him to our home.

I was excited. I hoped that they would be able to adopt him. In the months ahead, I kept believing it would happen. That’s what I would say when I prayed. I believe. 

More than a year later, it was official. Done. Owen was Cassie and Nick’s son and he was our grandson. 

I believed it would happen. As time passed and I was with him more and more, I knew that I could not bear any other result. 

During that early time in Owen’s life, it was Candace who spent much more time with Owen. I was working, still. My job was one that required much commitment and time. But, I knew Owen enough to know that I wanted him as my forever grandson.

There is something important that I need to add here. Along the way, just a couple of months before Owen’s adoption was finalized, Cassie gave birth to my grandson Archer. Good times just kept getting better.  

Owen is turning four this month. He is a big brother to Archer. He is a son to Cassie and Nick. He is a grandson to us. We do not take that lightly. Owen was intensely loved and wanted. I say that God delivered Owen to the parents who needed him. And, Owen was needing them. That is what I believe. 

At 67, I am okay with haircuts. That has not always been the case. Fifty years ago, as a high school senior, I swore off haircuts.

I suppose the story really starts back when I was a Fifth Grader and I asked Leroy the barber to give me a haircut like The Beatles. He chuckled and explained that was not something he could do that day. “You need some hair, first.” Leroy made a painful point. Sporting a crew cut, I did not give Leroy much to work with.  

In the years that followed, I managed to convince my mother and stepfather to allow my hair to grow a bit longer. In middle school, I ended up with bangs and enough hair to part on one side. By high school, that part had moved to the middle and hair was hanging down the sides enough to reach some reasonable level of “cool” in my teen brain.

Finally, when I was a 17-year-old senior, I went in for my last haircut for a long time. A really long time. It was January 1972 and I declared that I was not getting another haircut. I said stuff like that back then.  

By the time high school graduation arrived, my hair just barely reached my shoulders. There is a photograph of me from graduation that documents my hair-raising achievement at that point. I am standing at a podium speaking at the ceremony with a stupid mortar board cap perched atop my hair. I was on my way to teenaged freedom (as soon as I lost that weird cap).

By the time I arrived at college a few months later, I fit right in with many other young men who wore their hair to their shoulders and longer. It was 1972 and long hair, beards and mustaches were routinely seen at East Texas State University (now Texas A&M Commerce). I should mention here that I also started a mustache around that time. 

My roommate, Milton, was impressed with my hair. His father strictly forbid Milton growing out his hair as long as he was putting up the cash to send Milton to college. Somewhere along the line, Milton took a big comb of mine home to show his sister. I suppose it was some sort of evidence to back up his stories about my hair.

In January 1973, a year after I swore off haircuts, I drove Milton home to nearby Dallas to meet that sister. Her name is Candace. That weekend, I got a girlfriend and my comb back. I still have her, but the comb has gone missing again.

When Candace and I attended her high school senior prom that spring, our hair was, basically, the same length. We have the photographs to prove it. My hair hangs down across the front of my dark purple tuxedo in the photographs. I have never been able to duplicate that awesome look again.

In June 1973, 18 months after I swore off haircuts, I visited a barber shop for a trim. I brought it back to my shoulders, about how it looked when I graduated from high school a year earlier.

For several more years, I kept my hair long, although it never returned to the length it had reached by the summer of 1973. These days, I get my hair cut about once a month. The same person has been cutting my hair for nearly 30 years. Her name is Lisa. She and Candace do not support any idea I might have of going long again. I suggested it, but they laughed.

I am happy to say I still have my hair and the blonde-haired girl who was so impressed by my hair and me.

Standing outside the fast lane, I am reading that big companies are leasing enormous and expensive office spaces for their employees. When I read that a tech company is leasing the top six floors of a beautiful, new high-rise in a city, I think it is a safe bet that company expects to see their employees in those offices. That company is not leasing first-class office space so that their employees can work from a kitchen table in their homes.

When the pandemic arrived, a significant number of people began working from home, “Zooming” with colleagues and drawing on a considerable amount of familiar and emerging technology to make work, well, work from home. Early into all of that, I retired, in keeping with a plan in place before Covid-19 hit the fan. So, I am no expert on what that experience has been for those who have worked from home all or part of the time for the past couple of years.

Out riding on my bicycle this morning, I was thinking about how I would want to work these days if I were a full-time employee. Would I be disappointed to know that I would have to return to “the office” full-time? Would I hope to work out some sort of deal so that I could work at home some days and in the office on other days?

I did not have to wonder for long. I would want to be “in the office” more days than not. Perhaps, I would take one day each week to work at home on a particular assignment requiring extraordinary focus.  

For 30 years, I worked in Wake Forest University’s Communications and External Relations office. My job was full-time, but if you worked anywhere around me, you knew that I routinely worked well beyond full-time.  

When I retired, I participated in a Zoom retirement event in my honor. When it came time for me to speak, I stressed how grateful I was to have worked with so many hardworking, interesting, kind and warm people. Much of my work involved collaborating with such people in my office, as well as across the University. And, I loved that aspect of it.  

We collaborated on big University initiatives. We achieved goals that required challenging ourselves and one another to stretch professionally, with the result being that we were exhilarated by our achievements. We often announced exciting news, but there were sad announcements, too. Through it all, my colleagues and I formed bonds that keep several of us connected to this day. Shared experiences bring us together, I have learned.

I would not have wanted to miss working directly with my colleagues. In person. I am not saying we needed to do everything face to face, day in and day out. But, regularly working together was special. 

When I retired, I missed the people the most. I loved my work, even the responsibilities that prompted stressful long days and nights. But, I surely enjoyed the people with whom I worked side by side.

Friends and family members know I enjoy old TV shows. I’m talking about Gunsmoke, Route 66, The Twilight Zone, Star Trek (original), The Andy Griffith Show, Perry Mason and several others. Most of my favorites were made, at least initially, in the 1950s and 1960s. Why do I watch them? I do not know all of the reasons, but I have given it some thought. So, here goes.

I will begin with what I think is obvious to many who watch old shows. Outstanding actors, writers and directors worked on those famous TV series. That has something to do with why I have seen every episode of some I mentioned. And, I have made it a point to watch every episode of some series that may not be as well remembered these days, such as Peter Gunn and The Rebel.

Watching old TV shows is helping me, at this point in life, to study history. In particular, a history of our culture. I am not going to pretend to be any sort of scholar when it comes to our culture. But, by watching and listening closely, I am learning about our culture in this way. And, I am using culture in a broad sense here. I liked this definition I read on Wikipedia today: “Culture is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits of the individuals in these groups.”

It may surprise you to read here that I think Gunsmoke dealt directly with much that is not pleasant in culture. Poverty, abuse of women, child abuse, abuse of those with disabilities, fear and rejection of those perceived as different from everyone else, racism, loneliness, despair, greed, violent resistance to cultural change and, basically, all sorts of violence often carried out for senseless reasons. Those stories set in the 1870s were quite relevant a century later. Actually, the stories ring true today.

An excellent cast, brilliant writers and other “creatives” presented all of that in stories that kept viewers watching for 20 years, beginning in 1955. (For several years, a radio version of Gunsmoke was airing simultaneously, presenting the same themes with an entirely different cast.) I admit that it is not always easy to watch. Fortunately, Gunsmoke also featured occasional episodes that were comical and much lighter. I suppose all involved in the show knew that viewers needed a break, sometimes.

I also enjoy watching actors early in their careers in old TV shows before they became stars. You will see Robert Redford (Twilight Zone), Jack Nicholson (Andy Griffith Show) , Loretta Swit (Gunsmoke), Sally Kellerman (Star Trek), and so on. Some readers are likely aware of an interesting connection between Swit and Kellerman.

One of my new “hobbies” is going on IMDB to read about many of the actors I come across in old TV shows. I find that some left acting as young adults, choosing to pursue other careers and lifestyles. Some never got beyond small roles despite several years in TV and movies. I am especially fascinated by those who began TV careers late in life and made frequent appearances in seemingly every popular TV show for years. One of my favorites is Burt Mustin. You will find him in The Twilight Zone, The Andy Griffith Show, Bonanza, All in the Family, Dragnet and on and on. Mustin worked steadily until age 91 (Phyllis), a year before his death. Leave it to Beaver fans will remember him as Gus the Fireman.

Old TV shows, like old songs, also take me back to an earlier time in my life. When I see The Lawrence Welk Show, I drift back to my great-grandmother’s home, where the first color TV I ever saw stood in her combination living room/bedroom. Watching Johnny Carson’s Tonight Show, I am back in the little apartment Candace and I had in college. Lost in Space reminds me that I often had to watch summer reruns of it because it aired while my Boy Scout troop often met. I follow Bill Mumy (Will Robinson) on social media to make up for those lost episodes. The Man from UNCLE reminds me of the days my friends and I played our improvised Man from UNCLE game on the playground of St. Gregory’s elementary school. Mostly, we boys ran around playing rough enough to annoy the School Sisters of Notre Dame trying to keep us in line.

I will continue watching some old shows. I find some that I never knew existed (Casey Jones) or had forgotten (The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp). Seeing Hugh O’Brian again as Marshal Earp reminded me of how I started “packing” a cap pistol as a little boy because I wanted so badly to be Wyatt Earp.

I have not completely abandoned watching today’s TV shows. Currently, Candace and I are working our way through every episode of Heartland, a series set and made in Canada that started in 2007 and continues today. Of course, there are horses and folks in western wear, so that helps. We discovered it on Netflix (see how up-to-date I can be). And, we have seen The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel and Virgin River and so on. We also have enjoyed several British series, ranging from Doc Martin to Foyle’s War, in recent years.

Still, I have a special place in my heart for Marshal Dillon and Miss Kitty, Sheriff Taylor, Tod Stiles, Captain Kirk and others. A black-and-white visit to Dodge City or Mayberry is hard to beat.

On a beach trip, recently, I rode my bicycle past an old hotel that brought back some memories.

It is the hotel where Candace and I stayed on our short honeymoon nearly 47 years ago. The name is different, the paint is much brighter, but I find it easy to recognize the hotel that rises above the sandy shore at North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

I still remember checking into the hotel on the night of May 21, 1975. We arrived that night after our little wedding ceremony at the Methodist church in Wallace, N.C.. We were 20 and checking into a hotel. That was a big deal for us. In our young minds, we were grown. I am sure the fellow behind the hotel desk looked at us and knew we were really young. I might have looked 20, but Candace, who did not even hit 100 pounds on the scales, looked like she was still in high school. Of course, we were years from high school. At least some years.

Riding my bike past the hotel several times, I was impressed it is still there. I am impressed and happy that Candace and I are still around. And, still married.

When Candace and I were guests there, I never imagined that nearly a half century later we would be staying at a house a short distance away down the beach. In 1975, we were on our way back to Texas for my summer newspaper internship before returning to our Texas college. I never expected to live in North Carolina or ever to visit that beach again.

I thought about the life we have lived since we pulled into the parking lot in our 1965 Chevrolet Impala. College, graduate school, children, grandchildren, jobs, friends gained and friends lost, parents who have passed away. Good days, better days, hard days, worse days. And, we are still right here. That is not something that goes unnoticed and unappreciated by us.

When we decided to marry. Wait, here is the truth. Candace convinced me that the time had come to be brave and tell family that we were not waiting any longer. At spring break in 1975, Candace told her parents we wanted to marry and they agreed it was okay. Meanwhile, I told my mother in Texas and my father in Georgia. My father spent hours trying to dissuade me, telling me that I needed to wait until I was much older. When I pulled an Eric Burdon and declared “It’s my life and I’ll do what I want,” my father responded that he would not attend the wedding and would not help us in any way.

I did not know my father well at the time. He and my mother married young and divorced young. I was not around him much until after high school. My father assumed my marriage at a young age would fail as his did.

Candace and I stood up for ourselves and stood together before that minister who probably asked God to forgive him for marrying such young people. Looking back, Candace and I have one little regret about marrying at 20. We should have married when we were 19. I am serious.

I am sure you remember Prince’s “Little Red Corvair.” I had one.

Okay, I know he did not sing about my Chevrolet Corvair or anyone else’s. But, if he had ever owned one, he might have written a different song.

My red Corvair was my first car. It was well used (worn) and had been driven by my mother for a while. I do not recall the year model.

I had it all ready to go when I turned 16 in the summer of 1970 and received my drivers license. In those days, Texas let us highly responsible 16-year-olds drive all we wanted, with whomever we wanted and whenever and wherever we wanted. Officially, there were laws about how we drove, but my red beauty was too slow to get into much trouble, although I still managed to run into trouble. I will get to that soon.

My red Corvair had it all. Four doors, an automatic transmission with a tiny lever on the red dashboard to change gears, red vinyl bucket seats, a sprayed on “black vinyl top,” and an air-cooled engine in the rear with a fan belt that popped off too often. I added a Craig 8-track tape player under the dash to complement the AM/FM radio.

The tape player disappeared one night when I parked my little ‘Vair” in front of my family’s home. The police called me months later after finding it and many others that had been stolen. I retrieved it, re-installed it, but ended up with nothing to play in it when someone came along later and stole my tapes, but left the player.

The first time I put the Corvair on the road was the day after I turned 16. After driving only a few miles in my hometown, I had a meeting alongside a street with two City of Tyler police officers. Two things happened. First, I “failed to yield properly” at a busy intersection and nearly had a wreck. Secondly, the police saw the error of my ways.

So, as I pulled up to a home to pick up a friend, the police pulled in right behind me. And, yes, my friend and her parents looked out the windows to see what was going on. Oh, by the way, her dad’s brother was our county sheriff.

I ran into a good cop/bad cop scene. The older officer wanted to give me a ticket. The much younger officer wanted to give me a break, considering I had just celebrated a milestone birthday and all. The good news is I got only a warning ticket and my friend’s parents let her go for a ride in my car. Five years later, my wife, Candace, and I rented a garage apartment behind that same family for a summer. I did not wreck my car with their daughter in it, so they trusted me enough not to wreck their apartment, I guess.

I enjoyed a full year of driving my little Corvair. It had some mechanical issues, but I lived with them. The fan belt had a tendency to pop off every now and then, prompting me to become expert at forcing Corvair belts back on alongside many roads in and just outside my town. The transmission went bad, but my step-father and I replaced it with one we found in a junkyard. Fortunately, he owned a car paint and body shop, so I always had a place to work on my car. I still remember trying to get the transmission fluid out of my long hair.

By the next summer, I had enough money to buy a bigger car. A 1965 Chevrolet Impala. Automatic, small V-8 engine. Beige, four doors, bench seats. It really had it all, including air conditioning. That feature was missing from my Corvair, but I hardly noticed–in the winter. I lived in Texas, as I mentioned earlier.

Today, I wish that I had both of those nice rides in my driveway. Right now. I never imagined that I was driving classic cars that would be worth serious money. I paid $650 for the Impala in 1971; it would bring more in 2022. But, it is not about the money. I just miss those sweet cars. Especially, since I was driving that Impala when I took Candace out for the first time. She slid across that bench seat and sat right next to me. Now, that is a nice memory.