And then I get to *race one* of the new year, and it feels like finding the watch you lost under the sofa four months ago. You put it on, and all of a sudden… you’re all the way you again. Your wrist is appropriately adorned – and you can tell time!
To use a super corny automotive cliché, a lot of my life is in neutral when we’re not racing. I can write volumes, I can prepare stats and read old National Dragster magazines and lay out ideas and book travel and plan like crazy, but nothing, and I mean NOTHING does my heart good the way a racetrack can. Give me my sweet lil family, NHRA drag racing, and a few days by the Pacific Ocean and my joy meter is PEGGED.
I was recently asked if I had any friends outside of drag racing, and for a second, it threw me into a bit of an existential crisis.
Yeah, no. I mean, I do – but not ones I spend a lot of time/life with. I’m very close with my family, and we’re together as often as possible, but friends outside of blood or marriage? Not a one. Every friend I have is associated with this weird and wonderful world, and I wouldn’t change a damn thing.
I have interviewed a lot of racers, and one of my favorite questions to ask is, “What do you love about racing?” You would expect the answer to be “competition” or “winning,” right? Sometimes it is, but the No. 1 response, especially when I ask a Sportsman racer, is “the people.”
I love that. We’ve really got something special here, don’t we? This is living, man. Let’s love on this thing called drag racing for as much as we can until November, when we shall part ways and begin questioning our reality all over again.
Thanks for being here. Let’s go racing!
Categories: Musings, Uncategorized
Kelly Wade 