- First Name
- Nels
- Joined
- Aug 14, 2020
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- Location
- Northern CO
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- 2014 2D JK on 35’s
- Your Bronco Model
- Badlands
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- #1
Hello all, this weeks MIC news has been challenging for many so I thought I share a brief memory I recently rediscovered. Call it a purposeful distraction if you will.
When I was young I had an 85’ Bronco. It was black with a gray band & a red pinstripe. It was super clean and remains my favorite vehicle to date. It was so cool. To say I loved that vehicle was an understatement.
Unfortunately I only had this truck for short time, maybe 10 months or so before I crashed it twice! Stupid kid. The second time took place on a -10° MN night in which I slid off a gravel road, launched off a 15 foot retaining wall & rolled about 3 times. It was rowdy, blood was spilt. My two buddies and I all emerged battered in one way or another but luckily no one was seriously injured. Everyone walked away. To this day I’m convinced that the hip deep snow saved our lives.
The details of that night are long, and full of moments better told verbally over a beer. We had to walk many miles in the bitter cold until we found a farm that allowed me to use their phone so late at night. I had no choice…I had to call my father, confess my mistake and ask him to come retrieve us. When my Dad arrived he walked up slowly and just silently stood in front of me, observing. He looked at me kinda sideways for a moment as if to non verbally say “are you ok?”. I nodded yes. The only words spoken buy him that night were “where is the Ford?”
The next morning it was cold as hell, Dad made me walk down to the local service station, about 4 miles from my parents house, and hire a local tow truck to recover the vehicle. It was quite the task getting the Bronco back up the wall and onto the ice covered road. The tow truck was not strong enough to pull it up & out unassisted so I suggested “let’s see if it will start”, the tow truck driver agreed. Crawling back into the drivers seat was a challenge. At this point the Bronco was a complete mess. Every window was blown out, the roof was pushed in far enough to break the frames on both front seats and every body panel was thrashed. Despite spending the night on it’s side the old girl cranked right to life like nothing has happened. I locked the hubs and drove it up a near vertical wall while the tow truck gave it all the beans and pulled from above. When we finally got the truck back up on the road it died like a light switch and never ran again. I remember crawling out one of the back blown out windows and walking around to inspect the damage more closely. The entire scene caught up with me and I realized she was done. In my teenage frustration I punched the tailgate and the Ford emblem popped right out and landed at my feet. That was the winter of 1993.
Last week I took my kids to see my parents in MN and visit the family cabin. While helping my Mom go through some stuff in their garage I found the emblem!! I took it straight to my Dad, handed it to him and said “I’m sorry Dad, I still regret this”. He just smiled and said “It’s OK son”.
When I was young I had an 85’ Bronco. It was black with a gray band & a red pinstripe. It was super clean and remains my favorite vehicle to date. It was so cool. To say I loved that vehicle was an understatement.
Unfortunately I only had this truck for short time, maybe 10 months or so before I crashed it twice! Stupid kid. The second time took place on a -10° MN night in which I slid off a gravel road, launched off a 15 foot retaining wall & rolled about 3 times. It was rowdy, blood was spilt. My two buddies and I all emerged battered in one way or another but luckily no one was seriously injured. Everyone walked away. To this day I’m convinced that the hip deep snow saved our lives.
The details of that night are long, and full of moments better told verbally over a beer. We had to walk many miles in the bitter cold until we found a farm that allowed me to use their phone so late at night. I had no choice…I had to call my father, confess my mistake and ask him to come retrieve us. When my Dad arrived he walked up slowly and just silently stood in front of me, observing. He looked at me kinda sideways for a moment as if to non verbally say “are you ok?”. I nodded yes. The only words spoken buy him that night were “where is the Ford?”
The next morning it was cold as hell, Dad made me walk down to the local service station, about 4 miles from my parents house, and hire a local tow truck to recover the vehicle. It was quite the task getting the Bronco back up the wall and onto the ice covered road. The tow truck was not strong enough to pull it up & out unassisted so I suggested “let’s see if it will start”, the tow truck driver agreed. Crawling back into the drivers seat was a challenge. At this point the Bronco was a complete mess. Every window was blown out, the roof was pushed in far enough to break the frames on both front seats and every body panel was thrashed. Despite spending the night on it’s side the old girl cranked right to life like nothing has happened. I locked the hubs and drove it up a near vertical wall while the tow truck gave it all the beans and pulled from above. When we finally got the truck back up on the road it died like a light switch and never ran again. I remember crawling out one of the back blown out windows and walking around to inspect the damage more closely. The entire scene caught up with me and I realized she was done. In my teenage frustration I punched the tailgate and the Ford emblem popped right out and landed at my feet. That was the winter of 1993.
Last week I took my kids to see my parents in MN and visit the family cabin. While helping my Mom go through some stuff in their garage I found the emblem!! I took it straight to my Dad, handed it to him and said “I’m sorry Dad, I still regret this”. He just smiled and said “It’s OK son”.
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