It just makes you sick...

For the last 10 years, my father and I have been gradually and lovingly restoring and improving our 1974 Porsche 914 2.0. A road test is posted on this blog. All of our hard work came literally crashing to a halt on May 18th. As my father was driving home from Presque Isle this evening, an SUV rear-ended the left side while he was waiting to make a left hand turn. It then quickly reversed and sped away. My father was very fortunately unhurt, and after following the perpetrator to a dead end street, the SUV then backed over the front fender of the Porsche and took out the left side and the driver fled again.

This literally happened about three hours ago from this post - police are searching for the vehicle, but no positive license number was identified. We can only hope that justice will be served for this thoughtless crime.

Events like this are a reminder of the fragility of these machines that we care about so much, (and to many observers - far too much) and show how quickly the effort, expense, and plans we have involving them can be erased.

Let's face it - the numbers of this are a bit scary in black and white:

You spend $3500 on an old car in need of restoration.

You put in 10 years and who even knows how many more thousands of dollars into it.

You the put this 2500 lb. vehicle, now worth almost 7 times as much as when you bought it, on a road surrounded by many vehicles weighing twice as much at speeds from 0-100+ miles per hour.

In less than one second, it's all nearly destroyed. 

So why bother?

Well, this 914 for example... It's been a great bonding experience with my father since I was a young kid. He himself has known this exact car from the day his high school friend purchased it brand new in 1974 and would go out driving with him in it. I have countless fond memories of road trips to Watkins Glen and Mid-Ohio. Driving on brisk spring mornings surrounded by blossoming trees, cruising with friends on warm summer nights with the top off and looking up at clear skies and out over the two fenders and popped up headlights. Cool fall days with the heater on high and filling the cabin with a hint of burning oil from the humming and ticking air cooled engine behind. Cold winter afternoons with the whole car up on jack-stands and the engine apart and sitting before me in pieces, and all to make the car better so that we can go back to experiencing the same things mentioned before again in the spring. No matter what has happened to the car now, whether it be written off as a total loss, or it be laboriously repaired again, the memories and history attached to it will always have been worth the effort to me. 

Happy motoring - and be safe.