American River Review 2022 - copy - Flipbook - Page 28
“Kidney Bean Cadillac Dreams”
By Desirelli Driver
Someone holldered, “Automobile!” and I looked towards the highway and saw
a cloud of dust from the wake of a 1908 Cadillac Runabout. The great machine
roared down the gravel highway at a steady pace, its engine humming in its
highest gear. And people began to gather into small clusters on the side of the
road to watch the scene before them. Back then, there were all types. Of people, that is. Chinese, Italian, Irish, Mexican, Indian. They exited from Spinettis
Store, the bank, the Chinese laundry to witness the spectacle of the horseless
wagon, the motorized vehicle, the motor car. For lots of folks in this town, it
was probably the first automobile they’d ever encountered.
“Claude, Claude, get up!”
“How come?”
The engine’s combustion grew louder, and I called Claude over to
where I was standing to catch a glimpse.
“You have to see this,” I said without turning back.
I remember the color, the color of a water-soaked kidney bean left in
the sun to shine, its plush black leather seats, its giant gilded headlamps, the
large steering wheel protruding from the floorboard, and the horn. I’ll never
forget that horn. I thought it was a trumpet at first. I even wondered why there
was a trumpet on the driver’s side of the car, and He must be a musician. I realized
it was a horn when the driver squeezed it two times for a gallery of children
have gathered under an oak tree, who all had been on their backs staring up at
the sky just seconds before. They were on their feet, standing on intently staring at the car, gazing as if it were some exotic gem or stone. It may as well have
been the horn’s long toot, unpleasant yet extraordinary, a noise I had never
heard, like an animal’s caterwaul, and I listen to it to it all in my memory. Its
engine’s croupy sound bellowed through town, swallowing petrol and firing it
out in black fumes with every gear change like a cosmic romp, a tide of indecipherable intensity, finally reaching Main Street in Jackson proper, shaking itself
violently as the Amador County highway of paved concrete came to an end and
met with with Jackson mud, wheels wobbling uncontrollably until the driver
slowed the Runabout to a stop.
The driver peered out over the edge of the driver’s side at the ground
around him. He was stuck in the mud. The steady spring rains saturated all
the roads in Amador County from March till June, and getting from Volcano to
Jackson by auto was still out of the ordinary, this beautiful, mechanized creature like a sepia image from Harper’s Magazine in my head.
The driver stopped the engine and stepped out into the mud. He walked
through the earth as if it didn’t bother him. From his jacket pocket, he pulled
out a pair of leather, chocolate brown gloves. He put the gloves on his hands,
wiggling his fingers and interlocking them together to make sure they were on
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