CHAPTER 29 - 1980's Fuego

Chapter 29.......1980's Fuego

CHRISTMAS DAY......December 25, 2014

It was about 2PM in the afternoon while I was looking out the window of the 24th floor of the insurance company that I worked at on that afternoon...."What had happened ?" I thought to myself, as the sky at that hour is supposed to be sunny and bright during that time of day but instead it appeared to be 'midnight' due to the dark clouds that had formed up above in the sky.!!!

Now, before taking this story line any further in this Chapter, I would like to explain that yesterday on Christmas Day my Grandson Dean had asked me if I wanted to take a ride with him in his BMW Automobile that he and his Dad had purchase roughly a year ago....As I had never been in his car and all others were busy in their Freehold Home preparing for the events of this Christmas Day, I decided I would join him in his ride to the store....He needed to pick up some bottled water as their supply had unnoticeably dwindled to Zilch.....As we were driving along to the store Dean asked about my current car and than also about all the other cars I owned in my lifetime....I told him that there were many different cars over the years that I possessed and I thought to myself for a few moments about all these cars....

The one that came to mind, at that moment, was of the French car that I had purchased many years ago from a local Staten Islander that had advertised the sale of his Fuego....I took a ride on that day many years ago to the owner of this car to see its design as I had never viewed one of these French automobiles in the past and as there were no google things back in those days.... I had gone to his home with the thought of purchasing it depending on its overall looks and its mechanical condition....When I arrived at his home the car was located on his property for viewing to any buyers that might come along....It was luv at first site for me as the sporty design and condition was phenomenal....

I purchased the car with the thought in mind that this would be a great second car and would be used by my wife Elizabeth...

Now it would be six months later after purchasing this Feugo and we are returning to the story in mind for this automobile and the dark sky above as written in the first paragraph......When it was time to go home I had to take the usual subway ride to the Whitehall Station so as to take the Ferry Boat back home to Staten Island.....The sky was still cloudy and dark as the Ferry pulled out of the dock for its twenty minute journey....Half way across the canal the skies opened up to a tyrannical rain downfall with winds that I had never experienced in the past...I certainly thought that ride home would never be completed as the driving winds was making the boat tilt way over on its side....I had never seen this before and I was frightened just as all the other riders were too...Well as one would have it the boat did reach its destination to Staten Island without a mishap and all passengers disembarked from the Ferry.....I than drove home with my other car that was parked by the Ferry and I reached my home without any further ado until I received a call from my wife who had also arrived on Staten Island from her job in the City and was then about a mile from our home......

Elizabeth had explained that her Fuego had been under water from the storm and that she was unable to start it for the ride home....It seems that while we lived at the top of a hill and Elizabeth had driven her car that morning to the bottom of the hill, parked it in the street so as to take the Express Bus to work, when the few seconds of three inches or so of rainfall that occurred that afternoon, all the cars that were parked at the hills bottom had not only been re-arranged by mother nature from the fierce river of rain coming from the hills top to also destroy all these cars interior and engines...

When I reached Elizabeth with my car, I drove her home and than returned to the Fuego on foot and spoke to a neighbor that lived in a home at the bottom of this hill.....He explained that he had gone to the front of his house and opened the door to look out at the dark sky just before mother nature dumped all this water....He than walked to the back of his home and looked out of his back door when the Terrencial rain started coming down.....By the time he ran back to his front door in the few minutes that past, the river of rain was up over his 3 or 4 front steps of his home and all the cars parked outside were lifted by the so called river of rain and than let down in different spots on the street and sidewalks....After several attempts to start the car it did start again and I was able to drive it home only to never again be able to start it any more....The insurance company finally "totaled" the car for junk and took it for their disposition...

It certainly was a beautiful car but I'm sorry to say that we didn't have it long enough to thoroughly enjoy it.!!!......

Nick.....December 26, 2014

*******************************************************************************

ROY ORBISON

Published on Sep 19, 2012 Roy Kelton Orbison (April 23, 1936 -- December 6, 1988) was an American singer-songwriter, best known for his distinctive, powerful voice, complex compositions, and dark emotional ballads. Orbison grew up in Texas and began singing in a Rockabilly/country and western band in high school until he was signed by Sun Records in Memphis. His greatest success came with Monument Records between 1960 and 1964, when 22 of his songs placed on the Billboard Top Forty, including "Only the Lonely", "Crying", and "Oh, Pretty Woman". His career stagnated through the 1970s, but several covers of his songs and the use of "In Dreams" in David Lynch's Blue Velvet revived his career in the 1980s. In 1988, he joined the supergroup Traveling Wilburys with George Harrison, Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, and Jeff Lynne and also released a new solo album. He died of a heart attack in December that year, at the zenith of his resurgence. His life was marred by tragedy, including the death of his first wife and his two eldest sons in separate accidents. Orbison was a natural baritone, but music scholars have suggested that he had a three- or four-octave range.The combination of Orbison's powerful, impassioned voice and complex musical arrangements led many critics to refer to his music as operatic, giving him the sobriquet "the Caruso of Rock".[note 1] Elvis Presley and Bono have stated his voice was, respectively, the greatest and most distinctive they had ever heard. While most men in rock and roll in the 1950s and 1960s portrayed a defiant masculinity, many of Orbison's songs instead conveyed a quiet, desperate vulnerability. He was known for performing while standing still and solitary, wearing black clothes and dark sunglasses which lent an air of mystery to his persona. Orbison was initiated into the second class of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987 by longtime admirer Bruce Springsteen. The same year he was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, and the Songwriters Hall of Fame two years later. Rolling Stone placed Orbison at number 37 on their list of The Greatest Artists of All Time, and number 13 on their list of The 100 Greatest Singers of All Time. In 2002, Billboard magazine listed Orbison at number 74 in the Top 600 recording artists.

Death

While Orbison determinedly pursued his second chance at stardom, he reacted to his success in constant surprise, confessing "It's very nice to be wanted again, but I still can't quite believe it. He lost some weight to fit his new image and the constant demand of touring, as well as the newer demands of making videos. In November 1988, Mystery Girl was completed and Traveling Wilburys Vol. 1 was rising up the charts. Orbison went to Europe where he was presented with an award and played a show in Antwerp where footage for the video for "You Got It" was filmed. He gave multiple interviews a day in a hectic schedule. A few days later a manager at a club in Boston was concerned that he looked ill, but Orbison played the show to another standing ovation. Finally, exhausted, he returned to his home in Hendersonville to rest for a few days before flying again to London to film two more videos for the Traveling Wilburys. On December 6, 1988, he spent the day flying model airplanes with his sons. After having dinner at his mother's home in Tennessee, Orbison died of a heart attack at 52. Orbison's death was an international news event. Author Peter Lehman suggests that had he died in the 1970s when his career was in the doldrums, it might have earned a minor mention in the obituary section of the newspaper. However, the response to his death reflected just how popular Orbison had again become. The Nashville Banner put it on the front page across six columns; it also made the front page of the New York Times. The tabloid The National Enquirer suggested on its cover that he had worked himself to death. A memorial was held in Nashville, and another in Los Angeles; he was buried at Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery. In January 1989, Orbison became the first musician since Elvis Presley to have two albums in the Top Five at the same time. Music "A Love So Beautiful" by Roy Orbison (Google Play • iTunes • AmazonMP3) Artist Roy Orbison Category Music License Standard YouTube License