This is my car. It's a 1977 Datsun 280z. It was my dad's car - he was the original owner. Because he was in the military and we moved around a lot, this car is the one thing I have memories of from childhood. I remember my dad picking me up from pre-school in this car... I could barely see out the windshield, and I'd look over at him shifting with one hand, driving with the other, and I knew that I had the coolest dad in the world.
It got its name when my little sister, in a fit of inarticulate contrariness spluttered that she "would never get in that, that...BOMBFIRE!" She was a little girl and didn't understand how cool the sound of the engine was as it changed tone through the powerband. She didn't understand that it was ok that the car only had a radio, that it only has one side mirror, or that you have to hold the handles up when you close the door or else the locks release. She definitely didn't appreciate the stiffness of the sport-tuned suspension. Whatever, I have always known that this car was the epitome of cool. It wasn't expensive, extravagant, or showy like a Porsche. It isn't mainstream like an old Corvette of Mustang. It's a light car with an engine that puts out moderate horse power at absurd levels of torque. It's for someone who loves driving.
When I drive it, I hardly go a day without someone giving me a thumbs-up at a stoplight, or an older guy asking me about it at the gas station. Other z owners (almost all of them with newer cars) nod in appreciation, or rev their engines to get my attention when they are stopped behind me. But all of that isn't what makes this car cool. It's that it has been in my family for longer than I have. It's the car that my dad's parents helped
him buy. It's the car I rode to pre-school in, and it's the car that has followed our family to 9 houses.
That's what makes it cool.
But here's the thing. It's in good shape. Not great, but within striking distance of a restoration. And I'm going to school. If things go well, I'll be in school and training until 2017 - when the bombfire will be 40 years old. I can't afford to fix it up right now, and I don't really have a place to keep it for the next decade. I'm not sure how I'll drag it 2,600 miles to Los Angeles later this month, and I sure as hell don't know where I'll put it while I'm there. I'm not even sure it would pass the more stringent emissions standards in California, so I might not be able to drive it. So, I'm thinking I may have to sell it. That's what my mother is pushing for. I think that would break my heart.
So this thread may be the place where you guys tell me to be less emotional about it and do the smart thing. Maybe it will be the place where you tell me to forget smart and keep this as a memory of my childhood and my dad when he was still invincible. Maybe it'll just be a eulogy...
Without further adieu, the bombfire:
