The Devil's Right Hand.......Maybe....

"After my daddy left to fight the big war, I saw my first pistol in the general store." "I was 13, and I thought it was the finest thing I ever had seen." "So I asked if I could have one day when I grew up, and mama dropped a dozen eggs, man she really blew up." "She didn't understand, mama said that pistol is the Devil's Right Hand." "The Devil's right hand."  "First one I got was a cap and ball Colt, shoot as fast as lightning, but it loads a mite slow." "I soon found out, It'll get you into trouble, but it won't get you out." "Next one I got was a Colt .45, called the Peacemaker, but I never knew why." "Got into a card game in a Cumberland town, I caught a miner cheatin' so I shot the dog down, watched the man fall, he never touched his pistol , never had a chance to draw." "Trial was in the morning and they drug me out of bed, Judge asked me how I pleaded, "Not Guilty" "I said." "You've got the wrong man, no one touched that pistol but the Devil's Right Hand."  Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings were singing about guns, of course, but the same can be said for musclecars. I was born a gearhead. My dad's first car was a 1959 Pontiac Catalina coupe with the tri-power 389. After that, my dad was a lifelong Pontiac man. When I was in first grade, my mom had a '65 Pontiac Catalina 2+2 with the tri-power 421 and my dad had a '64 GTO with a 4-speed and 4.33:1 gears. Dad took me to the Pontiac dealer to get parts for the Goat, and on the showroom sat a gorgeous '68 Firebird. It was Yellow with a black vynil top and black interior and Rally II wheels. I thought it was so cool. I tried to talk dad into trading the GTO in on the Firebird. Then, a few months later , his pal Dave showed up with a green 400, 4-speed, '68 Firebird convertible, and took us for a ride. Because of the 4.33 gears, dad's GTO was faster in a drag race, but I didn't care, I thought that Firebird was the bomb. When I was a little older, another friend of my dad's got a 1970 4-speed, 440 / 6-pack Plymouth GTX. It was Red with black stripes and a blacked out hood, and it had white interior with bucket seats and a console and the "Pistol-Grip" shifter. Like Waylon said-"I thought it was the finest thing I ever had seen."  I was there when he raced, and barely lost to a Hemi Road Runner in a drag race. Then I saw Vanishing Point in theatres. My dream car was then an Alpine White Challenger. Much to dad;s dismay, I was a Mopar fan. When I was in high school, my dad got a '78 400, 4-speed, WS6 Trans-Am. It was super cool, But I wanted a Dodge Li'l Red Express pickup. Until I saw the Judge on a used car lot. Carousel Red, with American Racing Torq-Thrust mags on it. 14X6 in front and 15X10 in the rear with F70-14, and N50-15 Mickey Thompson tires. It was a Ram Air III, 4-speed model, with 4.33:1 gears. Who buys that for a 16 year old?  I think dad got it as much for him as for me, but I forgot all about the Little Red Truck. It was warmed-over by a previous owner. It had headers and loud exhaust, a Crane Cam slightly hotter than an RAIV, and an Offenhauser dual-quad intake with two AFBs on it. It had a badass lope, but stable idle. Pulling the Hurst shifter on the Rock-Crusher into 1st gear was like racking the slide on a 12-guage shotgun. Forget the "Bullitt" or Vanishing Point" soundtrack, when I wound up the Judge-the intake roar was louder than the exhaust. I was King Kong in our town. I smote all challengers in biblical fashion. 396 Chevelles, 400 Firebirds,428 Mustangs, 440 Super Bees, 427 Corvettes, 429 Torinos, I showed my taillights to them all. I also got 23 tickets and lost my driver's liscence in less than a year. "No one touched that Hurst Shifter, but the Devil's Right Hand" The judge ( A real judicial one, said I had to sell the car or do a year in jail ) . Didn't help. I sold the Judge and bought a '68 SS396 El Camino. Over the years I had many other musclecars. My brother-who's twelve years younger than me, and loved my GTO and my "Smokey and the Bandit" '77 T/A-got for his first car-A '69 GTO!! It wasn't a Judge, but he too lost his liscence in less than a year. Much to my wife's dismay-when my son was very little and I first got my Hurst / Olds, he would tell every one "Daddy's white car goes "Rump-Rump". "Daddy's car Goes Fast". When I was going into the hospital for major surgery a few years ago-my son who's now 19-told his sister-"If he dies, I get the Hurst / Olds."  My wife was motified, but I understood, and so did his grandpa and his uncle. It may not be the Devil, but there's some powerful force that draws little boys to musclecars. And we buy them when we get to be big boys. That's why theirs 400 hp Camaros, Challengers, and Mustangs to this day. Despite EPA regulations, and howls from tree-huggers, and derision from tweed-cap wearing pipe-smoking journalists that espouse overhead cam four-bangers and Turbo V6s, and all-wheel-drive, the archaic, throwback,rear-wheel-drive, big pushrod V8 American Musclecar-mechanical pornography to some still shows their taillights to these tech wonders costing double their price and simply will not go away. The reason is cable TV and car shows. Everytime "Bullitt" or "Vanishing Point", or "Smokey and the Bandit" or "White Lightning" is shown on late-night TV, or a dad takes his son the drags or a "Show-n-Shine"- "Another possible future Prius driver bites the dust." Or maybe the Devil's right hand reached out..... Mastermind