1 post tagged “car”

What's the most valuable thing you've ever had stolen?

Original music. But I want to tell a different story.

A car. And it wasn't even that great of a car. It wouldn't drive in the rain and it had some other issues.

I left for a night of merriment with my boyfriend and when we came back my car was gone.
I was standing in the space where my Kermit green Toyota Corolla had been - actually looking around me like the thing might appear at any moment - asking, "You DID pick me up, right? I DIDN'T leave my car at your place, right?"

The police came and asked me a bunch of questions. Where was I when it happened?
 - Out with the boyfriend.

Did I notice anything out of the ordinary?
- Yes, I do not recognize that pick-up truck and it was here when we left.
We would find out later that the car thief had stolen that pick-up truck and left it for my car. The pick up looked like it was in a lot better shape than my Toyota.

Did I have any idea who might have stolen the car?
- Stevie Wonder must have stolen my car because only a blind person would steal a car that looked like that.

Then the 40-ish African American policeman said something that made me gasp and take a step back. He said, "It was probably some of those nigger kids over in the next neighborhood. That car will be chopped before you know it."

Was this guy testing me? Certainly he was not serious! Did he just say what I thought I heard? By the look on the boyfriend's face - he had. I reminded him it was a Toyota Corolla from the SIXTIES, not a Porsche.  I tried not to show too much disgust, because I wanted my car found.

When it was found it was wrecked. All the tires were flat and it wouldn't turn over. It had also been in a hit and run. My dad decided that it wasn't worth keeping, so he traded what was left of my beloved green Toyota for the cost of the tow to the junk yard.
I cleaned out everything and found some weird and telling stuff in the floorboards.
Candy wrappers - the thief or thieves had a major Baby Ruth and Twix habit.
Cassette tapes of music I hate: Ozzy Osborne, Bark at the Moon...Z Z Top, Fandango! - The thief or thieves had shit taste in music and no car stereo system to play it on!

The one thing I did not find that I lament the loss of to this day is a file folder full of flyers.
At the time, one of my freelance jobs was creating the show flyers for a punk club in town called The DMZ (now Vino's) and I had left a folder of about a years worth of original flyers in the backseat of my car. This was before the day of digital graphics - so each one of these flyers was created by hand...with glue and pens...then taken down to Kinko's for duplication. I imagined these car thievin'  wankers, driving down the street, hopped up on chocolate, smashing into parked cars while shredding and throwing my flyers out the windows like confetti.

The car thief was eventually found and thrown in jail. I can't remember his name, although one of them was Christopher. Christopher Something or Something Christopher...

The car? Well, it was on it's last leg anyway. The valuable thing was the contents of that folder. History.