The Sudden Bucket

"He's off and flying as he guns the car around the track, he's jamming down the pedal like he's never coming back, adventure's waiting just ahead!" - Theme from Speed Racer

High speed stunt driving has always been a hobby of mine. For me, the e-brake isn't just for parking, and heel-toe is a verb, not two nouns. I like the challenge presented by road friction, and that euphoric feeling that only comes from pushing a car sideways through a curve.

As you can imagine I enjoyed the experience I had yesterday when, while traveling in the far left lane at speeds well above the posted limit on a thoroughly moistened segment of Route 9 in Cromwell, I was suddenly faced with an errant, and, might I add, very sudden, bucket. This bucket was casually hanging around in the center of my lane, leaving me with three options: either swerve right into the other lane and possibly collide dramatically with a tan minivan full of pre-teen soccer practice and snacks, swerve left to the shoulder which wasn't so much a shoulder as it was a four foot of bank snow and ice, or gun it and give the bucket what for.

I chose left. I still feel that this was the right decision, even though my rear tires caught the slick of the shoulder, which left me rowing my way out of a high-speed Swan Lake. Fishtailing at 80 miles an hour on a busy stretch of highway during rush hour is not for the faint of heart, but it is one hell of a rush for those in search of high-octane kicks. The deep rumbling noise as your car, from the driver door to the taillight drags along all that snow and ice, while nerve-splitting, lends a textured, musical quality to the moment. But that mild assistance from the snow bank allowed me to pull out of the slide victorious, and without losing much speed. The only evidence that I was ever there is the snow under my door handles and the flat spot on the snow bank.

What did I learn? I learned to trust my instincts, and also that any sudden dramatic change of direction at highway speeds is as good as any roller coaster and much, much cheaper.