I wish I had pictures from where I started out! I was 13 and the neighborhood boys and I went into this old what we thought was a shed. I there was an old bed, and a stereo with speakers, or I should say HiFy, some advertising stuff in a case, and old desk. I thought that if the man really wanted this stuff, he'd put it in his 8 bay truck garage. I thought like his dogs he didn't want them any more, so I took 1 speaker, and some old keys like to dressers, and cabinets. There was nothing in the shed these keys seemed to go to! There were some old kind of brown signal fuses, that none of us wanted. We figured the mice had gotten to them fro all the sawdust in the wooden case.
Well about a month after the first time we took some stuff, we went back, and looked around again.There was the wooden file cabinets, and the desk not much else. Except for the fuses. I took one out, and there was sweat on it I wiped tho of it off, and when it hit the floor, there was a bang like an M80. This scared the poop right out of us, so I ever so genitally put it back in the saw dust, and we all got the h e double toothpicks out of there. An other kid took about 4 of those fuses, and was running from the cops when he fell. The ones he had were dried out. This kid snitched on me, and I had the cops show up asking about how much dynamite we took. I asked what dynamite, I thought those were safety fuses? You got to remember we grew up around smudge pots, and red globe kero lanterns for traffic control.
We were taken to court, and I had a year of probation. I went to the man and I tried to talk to him. Tell him I was sorry. He was a fowl mouth old miserable shell of a former hard working man. Finally after about a week I was able to plead my case with him. I told him that the speaker I got I thought he didn't want, so like trash I just took it. I said with the condition of tis shed I thought he'd abandoned it, no windows, sagging floor 3 dog skeletons, and rats. What did the lock on the door mean? I thought you didn't want the either, and then I told him that I work off the damages, thinking that I'd be mowing his lawn, and cleaning up around his construction yard. He told me that if I was serious about making it right, to be there 6:00 am the next morning with a lunch, and plan on the whole day! I showed up a 5:55 am, and regretted it by the end of the day. I shoveled a truck load of top soil, and he dumped it in an other spot. He was kind of laughing, and told me to be back tomorrow the same time. Thinking I would show, he didn't come down until about 9:00. Not really knowing what to do, I toped the fluids in his B47, D3 Cat dozer with backhoe, the crane, and his pickup.
After about a month a farmer west of town called for a load of top soil. Wanted 15 yards. Elton was too blind to see to drive. He had me take the load at about 1:00 and told me if I wasn't back by 2:00, he'd know that I had problems. He knew I was 13, and I didn't have a license. That alone sent him on a cussing spree that lasted just over 20 minutes, which boiled down to either your going to work, or your a liar and a thief.
I'll never forget the look on my dads face when I drove up the access road which our driveway was on. My dad was a pro driver driving truck for a living. When he got home he asked me if I was the one driving the old mans dump, and I said yes. He then told me that I was to NEVER Driver unlicensed on the street ever again. The liability to him was too great, which was one of dads favorite catch phrases. I learned a lot about trucks and gas motors with 5X3 and 5X4 twin sticks.
In 2000, I was driving a twin HI/LO/RX5 in an R model with a 238 diesel triaxle! A driver in a condo unit was cussing me because I just got on the expressway, and I was working her up to speed when he came up on me. If you can't drive that thing then get it off the road was the gist of his complaint. I simply with being mad said that I was a newer driver and I didn't know everything, and I sure would like him to show me how to shift a twin stick. Silence. I repeated that any help on driving a twin stick Mack would be helpful. Still silence. I then told that driver that he show never complain about what another driver is doing. Someone else said I think you scared him off with the twin stick talk. I made sure that this was no BS that Mack had 2 sticks the changed gears coming up out of the floor!