During Thursday’s gray morning, a grandfather taught his grandson how to drive a ’46 Chevrolet pickup.
“Don’t forget to choke it,” 83-year-old Charlie Watkins said from the passenger seat.
“It needs it,” he said, and pulled the choke knob.
Ryan Watkins, 22, pushed the ignition button on the floorboard with his foot.
The engine wouldn’t turn over.
“We’re going to get it running,” Charlie Watkins said. “Just need a minute.”
It was quiet at the Columbus Soccer Complex parking lot, where the lesson was taking place. A half hour earlier, dawn had come.
“Wait a second,” Charlie Watkins said, still holding the knob.
Ryan Watkins usually drives a 2014 Ford Mustang. About two months ago, though, his father bought this old truck.
It has three gears and no power steering. Tops out at about 55 mph. Nothing computer-like about it. They don’t make them like that anymore. Likely never will again.
Something about that attracted Ryan Watkins’ attention. He asked his grandfather to show him how to drive the old truck.
“I figured he could help me, since he grew up with them,” he explained.
Charlie Watkins retired from his full-time job more than two decades ago. So a morning with his grandson, passing along all he knew about an old pickup, was not a problem.
“I’m honored to teach my grandchild,” he said.
After a few more false starts, the engine, beneath that antique and faded hood, came alive at last.
“Drop it in gear,” Charlie Watkins said, and Ryan Watkins did.
They eased off together in the truck, circling empty playing fields again and again, gaining speed in straight-aways, slowing down in curves.
Then Charlie Watkins went his way for the day, and his grandson went his. The morning’s fog had lifted, and though still separated by more than 60 years, they had been made closer, in a little way, by that old truck’s lesson.
William Browning was managing editor for The Dispatch until June 2016.
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