Actually,  I did have a couple of V8’s back when Triceratops still roamed the highways and byways.  But after some recent action and adventure in my anemic little S10,  I found myself pining for the old, “Detroit Iron” days with every hill I had to drive over.  On every down slope, I thought back on my V8’s with a fondness I reserve for old lovers. 

My first was a ’77 Mustang.  It was pure fuckulance wrapped around a lovely 302  (that’s 302 cubic inches for all you young’ns).  I could do brake-stands without using the brake.  I’d just stomp the pedal,  the ass-end would skip off the pavement,  and she would come down in all her howling glory.  Sold it to an exchange student for 500 bucks and went to a ’76 Aspen SE.  That one hauled a fair amount of ass as well.  It had 318 under the hood, but a craptastic carb.  It would flood out if you took a corner too quickly.  And just like old lovers, you forget their foibles over time and only remember the good.  In the years since the Late Cretaceous Period,  I’ve had nothing but wimpy little four-bangers.  My ’77 Porsche 924 was the exception.  It was pure sex.  It had four cylinders but they were four, very big cylinders.  But even so,  it lacked the thing I love most about V8 engines:  raw power.  And a big, warm, throaty sound.

You know,  I picked up “Mad Max” a while ago and dropped it in the DVD player.  I turned on my speakers and…there it was.  There was that F-U rumble and howl I had forgotten since the world moved on.  I closed my eyes and soaked it all in.  I remembered putting the pedal to the metal and being shoved back in my seat as I blew past a semi.  I remembered the vibrating thrum that would come through the carpet on the tranny hump,  assuring me all was right with the world.  How I skipped and danced when I heard an Olds 455 Rocket fire up for the first time!  How I loved watching the hood come up when my buddy with a 351 Windsor downshifted into passing gear!  How  giddy my fear was when the air-induction on my sister’s Camaro opened up,  flooding her 350 four barrel with speed and win!  (It’s true. My sister ROCKS!)

Anyhow, I have come to believe that the North American car industry died not this past fall,  but when poets (with big effin nuts) stopped making cars.  The bean counters and marketing folks took my lovers away from me around the time Lee Iacocca found his desk at Chrysler.

“But Ringmaster, with new tech and new alloys, you can get the same or greater horsepower with a quarter the size and less fuel to boot!” 

It’s true.  I can.  I can also change this: 

“Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood  And looked down one as far as I could”   (Thank you Mr. Frost)

To this:

“There’s this fork in the road.  I wanted to travel both at the same time but couldn’t.  I was sad about it.” 

See what I mean?

Sure I could “drift” all “fast and furious”.  It’s not the same.  New cars can do stuff,  but they don’t make me feel stuff. 

You wanna save the North American auto industry?  Hire poets.