Lyn St. James in training

I've been saying I'm a racecar driver for years. But my only real track time consists of a couple of Northwoods Shelby Club track days at Road America. Considering that's closer to racing than most people get, no one could really dispute me.

So when Colin decided a trip to Bondurant Driving School would make for a great anniversary gift, my initial reaction was excitement. However my excitement was soon replaced by fear. Going to driving school is the first step to getting a competition license. What if I didn't pass? What if I crashed and burned? A poor performance at driving school could out me once and for all, completely discrediting the happy little delusion I'd been living - and letting others believe - that I was in fact, a racecar driver. Plus I was pretty sure Colin would decide I was unfit to marry if I couldn't pass driving school. 

But this is what I wanted, wasn't it? I wanted to have some concrete evidence behind my "I'm a racecar driver" story. So off I went to Bondurant driving school in search of my competition driving license and my nerve. 

Bondurant has a photographer on staff to take pictures of the students along with offering the option of having an in car camera installed to capture your track time. Naturally, I thought it'd be great to have the experience captured forever on a DVD. Two laps in it dawned on me, maybe the in car camera wasn't the best decision. Simply because it meant that if I did in fact fail, now there'd be documentation of my failure. I couldn't make up a story about mechanical failure, poor teaching or the lack of talent on behalf of another student because the whole experience would be caught on camera as proof. I seriously considered exiting the track so as to have the camera removed. But then I realized I was driving a C6 Corvette on a racetrack and instead of focusing on my impending failure, I should really be concentrating on the track. Isn't concentration the first defense against making a fatal mistake anyway? 

That was the last thought I gave to not passing the class. Honestly, how bad could I do? I'd had track time (though limited), Colin's confidence and an innate desire to go fast paired with just a hint of being overly cautious all on my side. Plus, it's the job of the instructors to teach me and guide me and make sure I pass. So if I didn't pass it was more a reflection on their ability as teachers than on my ability as a driver. (Isn't it nice to be able to rationalize anything?)

I did pass the class. And I even showed Colin the DVD. It wasn't the embarrassing evidence of what a poor driver I am I was worried it would end up being, besides that fact that maybe it showed a little more of my overly cautious side than my desire to go fast side. In fact, the DVD is really a great teaching tool. Colin and I can watch it together and he can help show me where I did well and where I could use some improvements. 

Now all I need is a racecar. Any sponsors out there? 

Life, 14 seconds at a time

When I road raced I was always surprised how calm the atmosphere inside the car was. With long straights stretching the engine to peak rpm's before every shift followed by the start of the braking zone before downshifting and then entering into a graceful turn and back on the accelerator. I'd expected it to be chaotic. But it was peaceful. No oncoming traffic, no real hurry. It was about planning, thinking, maneuvering. Basically it felt like being on a deserted open road, free to manipulate the car anyway you want, as fast as you could. Ultimately trying to reach the finish line first, but, with the exception of a crash at the start line, the race certainly wasn't won in the first sixty feet. To me, road racing is about what happens along the way. Road racing is ballet on wheels with the miles in between being the crescendo into the final scene, the curtain falling as you cross the finish line. Road racing is refined.

So when I tried drag racing for the first time, I thought the atmosphere inside the car would be the same. But I found out drag racing is raw. Drag racing is chaotic. A controlled frenzy. You have a quarter mile to go and you want to get there as soon as possible - but not necessarily as fast as possible. Fast doesn't always mean first. It's possible to drive faster than your competitor and still lose. A drag race can be, and most often is, won in the first sixty feet. Reaction time. Simplified, drag racing is reaction time. Stage. Wait for the lights. Yellow. Get the rpm's up. Yellow. Hold it there. Yellow. React. Green. Are you already launched? Did you hook up? Don't spin the tires. Feather the throttle. Shift. Floor it. Shift. Faster. Shift. So much going on, and in so little time. There's no room for error. React late, dump the clutch, spin the tires, those mistakes can all mean defeat. Drag racing's not like road racing where you have lap after lap, mile after mile to make up for a mistake. There's no planning. No maneuvering. It's react as fast as possible, hook up and go and it's over. Did your win light come on?

For all intensive purposes, I'm an idiot

For all intensive purposes? For all INTENSIVE purposes? What the hell was I thinking?

If you ask me what my talents are I'll tell you I don't really have any. And it's true. I'm just sort of okay at a handful of things. But if you ask me what my strengths are I'll tell you I'm good with words. Spelling, writing, editing, proofreading.

I like to think of myself as intelligent, and don't think other people would disagree. So when I crafted an email to my future stepmother-in-law, who just happens to be a lawyer, and more intelligent than I, you can imagine my horror when I realized I'd made myself sound like a complete idiot. To quote myself, I'd written, "For all intensive purposes..." What followed is not important here. What's important is the fact that I'd written something so ridiculous. This sort of thing would make me cringe if I had read it somewhere else. I mean I'm the type of person who will refuse to eat at a restaurant if there are too many typos on the menu. Seriously, I've walked out because the menu was so offensive to my English sensibilities.

Perhaps this is a type of grammar-snob karma coming back to bite me. For all those times I'd laughed at some poor idiot for not knowing how to spell, or for using a word in the wrong context, I'd now made a fool of myself.

Most likely, now someone is going to make it their mission to point out every typo in my posts. So for all intents and purposes, I welcome your criticisms, as it seems grammar-snob karma has deemed me an appropriate target.

Bulking up

Genetics only take you so far when it comes to your body. At some point you need to start doing some activity or you're going to pack on the lb's. I figured I'd reached that point. I made it a good quarter of a century looking decent without much excercise. But everyone always says the older you get, the harder it is to get back in shape. So I decided it was best not to chance a complete downward spiral by waiting much longer. Plus Colin, nine years my senior, was ready to start living a more active lifestyle as well. He was one of those guys that until recently could eat anything he wanted and not gain weight. So what a rude awakening he had coming when one day he stood on the scale to find himself a hefty 30 pounds over his fighting weight, so to speak.

Knowing that I didn't have the discipline to workout consistenly on my own, as one of my very more developed talents is rationalizing with myself why I shouldn't do the things I'm supposed to do, we hired a personal trainer. He's a little muscly guy with a shaved head. He fits the personal trainer profile. If I ever find myself in a brawl, I want his scrappy ass on my side.

So how's it going you ask? Well it's going great for Colin. He's down at least two pant sizes, I'd say a good four inches, and at least 20 pounds. But it's hard to guage exactly how much weight he's lost because he's gained so much muscle. I love to grab his biceps when he flexes - how's that for cliche! But I can't help it. He was sexy before, now he's super sexy.

Me on the other hand...I've lost -10 pounds and am down -1 dress size. Yes those are negatives. So to put it more clearly, I've gained weight and gone up a size. What the hell? This is not supposed to happen. I wanted to get healthy and tighten up those soft spots that were developing. I've tightened up most of them up, but I've also bulked up some. Everyday I struggle with whether I'd rather be soft and smaller, or toned and take up more area. Let's just say, I'm much more athletic in person. I've gained mass everywhere - well not everywhere. Naturally, the one place I'd like to amass some extra tissue, my chest, has gotten smaller. How's that for icing on the cake?

The first thing people ask is, "Well are you eating more?" The answer is no. In fact I'm probably eating less, and eating more healthy. So I don't know what the deal is. When I was at my peak of in shapedness and playing high school sports I was never this muscly. My legs have always been athletic, but I was always lean. Why can't I be that way now?

For those of you who know me, let me just clarify I'm not trying to say I'm too big or overweight, because that would be crazy. I'm very realistic about my body. I'm just saying, when I joined a gym and decided to pay a personal trainer to kick my ass three days a week I didn't expect to gain weight. Just so we're clear, I don't want any hate mail or people telling me I need to see a shrink to work out my body image issues.

With that said, Colin's an asshole (and I mean that in the nicest way possible) for losing weight and getting svelte, and I'm, well I'm perplexed.

Money as metal

Yesterday I held $5 million in my hand...give or take half a mil.

First I just stared at it. Taking it all in. The way a person stares at a pile of puzzle pieces deciding where to begin. How to tackle the task at hand. Then slowly I began to touch it. I stroked it front to back, top to bottom, trying to memorize how every smooth, cool line felt beneath my fingers. I wanted to pause this moment in time so that I could burn the image into my mind, engrave it into my memory like a jeweler inscribes a heartfelt message on a piece of fine jewelry. The inscription in my mind would say, "You have touched greatness, you lucky bitch."

People would give a kidney to have been in my place today. How did I get this opportunity, and who has 5 mil just laying around for me to play with? Well this 5 million was not cash, but instead in the form of cars. And it was my honor to dust them off and wipe them down with detail spray. I'm probably in the minority, but if given the choice I'd take the cars over brief cases filled with cash any day. Of course if I did have the cash, I'd just use it to buy cars.

So how many cars does it take to equal $5 million? In this case, only seven, comprised of one very dirty 1957 Mercedes SL Prototype, 1961 Austin Healey 3000, a Meadowbrook winning 1965 Shelby GT350, a '66 GT350, a 1968 L78 Chevrolet Camaro, a 1974 Ferrari Dino, and the coup de grâce, a 1966 Ford GT40 Mark I. How's that for a dream car garage lineup? Some American muscle paired with some European sports car styling.

Of course the Dino and the GT aren't allowed to park next to each other. They don't play nice as the Dino is still bitter about his predecessors losing to Ford at Le Mans. You'd think after 40+ years the Ferrari would just accept the loss and move on.

I didn't get to drive any of these cars yesterday, but as my reward for cleaning them - as if cleaning them weren't reward enough - I got to drive something else as a means of my first drag racing lesson. A 1965 Pontiac GTO. Tri-Power. Next weekend is the Supercar Reunion, and I will be drag racing. Look for me around the means streets of Milwaukee this week, practicing my launch. I've already amassed one fan. Some guy pulled over to watch as I was getting ready to launch and told me he wanted to see me light 'em up. I was more than happy to try and oblige. I wonder if he's always dreamed about finding some cute young blonde driving around squealing the tires of some old Goat?

Wedding dress

I picked up my wedding dress today. We just set the date a week ago, but I already have my dress. I ordered it in March. It was the first dress I tried on. It took me a total of seven minutes to find my perfect wedding dress.

Oh the horror of it, right? Only seven minutes? Girls wait their whole lives to pick out their wedding dress, it's supposed to take more than seven minutes. My mother expressed that very sentiment when she told me she was disappointed because her and my sisters were looking forward to the hours and hours and hours of bridal gown shopping. What I'm finding out is I'm not the stereotypical bride. I'm okay with that. And I think my fiance is okay with that. Hopefully our guests will be okay with that.

It's so funny though because for some reason people, mostly my family and soon to be in-laws seem to already have this idea that I'm going to be a typical bride. For instance my mother said, "Well, I guess I better start looking for some boring beige, stuffy, taffeta mother of the bride outfit." To which I took offense. I'm not even sure what the bridesmaids or the groom are wearing, I certainly don't have any rules for what my mother should wear. So I told her, wear whatever you want, I want you to have fun. Then a few months later I get the same thing from my future mother-in-law, Deila. She said, "Well I better call your mother and see what's she's wearing so we can coordinate. I know there's so much etiquette involved." I told her the same thing, wear what you want. I love her sense of flare anyway and I want her in a showy Deila outfit. An outfit with some character, some flare and some color. Just like her personality.

People need to understand our wedding is going to be fun and is about celebrating family and friendship and less about the ceremonial aspect. The dress and the tuxes and the church are more just a formality leading up to the celebration.

When I think about my dream wedding, I don't have a complete vision from start to finish. I never have. My eventual matrimony just wasn't what consumed my thoughts. I had better things to dream about - like being a race car driver. Not to mention that certain key pieces of the dream wedding puzzle were missing. How could I plan my dream wedding in my mind when I hadn't met my dream guy yet. So when I finally found that piece of the puzzle (Love you Colin) the rest has started to fall into place. Colin and I will create the perfect wedding together, instead of him having to fit into some prearranged template I dreamed up years ago.

After we got engaged I did start to envision what I wanted. Color scheme was the main aspect that I actually had some idea of what I wanted. We have a '53 Buick Skylark in a lovely shade of green called Pinehurst Green. I thought it would look good for the bridesmaid dresses. For some reason my girls weren't sold on the green. But I hadn't given up...until today. When picking up my dress, my sister Rachel (a bridesmaid, naturally) and my matron of honor Jaime were present, just to make sure we still liked my dress - which we did of course. Then we addressed the issue of the bridesmaid dresses. What did we go with? Well, not green. Instead Rachel found a cream dress with sections of black lace overlay. And four different styles. One for each girl. So, as you can see, if I'd already had my whole wedding planned, we couldn't have made such spontaneous decisions. Plus this way, if they don't like their dresses, it's their own fault. They picked them out.

Brush with fame - literally

Do you remember the TV show Happy Days? It's okay if you don't, I'm a little young to remember myself. Happy Days was on the air from 1974-1984 and featured Henry Winkler as Fonzie or "The Fonz." The show revolved around a family in the '50's with The Fonz as the epitome of cool. Considering it was on for 10 years, I guess you could say it was a big hit.

So what's the point? Well Happy Days was supposed to be set in Milwaukee, the town I currently call home. Well on Monday I was boarding a plane in LAX heading back to Milwaukee. And who's taking up the first three rows? Most of the major players of Happy Days, including The Fonz. My fiance, Colin, at nine years my senior, found this to be a much more significant encounter than I. He grew up with Happy Days. I was faced with a celebrity. Should I exclaim loudly, OMG, you're Fonzie!? No, that didn't seem right. Should I nonchalantly say hello, like he's not some celebrity? No, that somehow seemed disrespectful, because he is a celebrity. So I just walked by and took my seat. No reaction, no acknowledgement that I'd just walked past Henry Winkler.

Here I was at a moment I'd always dreamed about. Not walking past Henry Winkler per se, because, well Henry Winkler doesn't really register on my radar, (No offense, Fonz, but you're just a little too soon before my time to get my motor running) but what I'm talking about is meeting a celebrity.

I've always hoped that when I actually met a celebrity I'd say the perfect thing. Something clever and witty to make me standout. Something that would make the celebrity want to discover me, or befriend me, or write a song about me. I know, this is not reality, but you never know. Why couldn't I make such an impact on someone? Well for starters, I'd actually have to say something, but I always clam up and discover myself at a loss for words. As a writer, I should never be at a loss for words. The same thing happened when I met Chip Foose. I thought, here's my chance, I'm meeting one of the great masterminds of automotive design, say something memorable. So what did I go with..."Hi, it's so nice to meet you Mr. Foose." That's all, well that witty repartee paired with the deer in the headlights gaze.

So as I sat in my seat, I kicked myself for missing a second opportunity to at least make a celebrity laugh, if not make a lasting impression. And I vowed next time I would do better. And next time came much sooner than anticipated. When we landed in Milwaukee, there was one of two baggage carousels our luggage was going to come up on, but we didn't know which carousel it would be. So we took our place in line by carousel and waited. When the luggage didn't come within a few minutes Colin said he'd wait by this one and I could go check the other. Good plan. So as I'm navigating through the sea of other passengers awaiting their luggage, BAM, someone runs into my left side. I turn to say "Excuse me," and no shit if it isn't Henry Winkler. This is the opportunity I was waiting for. Here was my chance. Not only did he run into me, but I had him as my captive audience. I would not mess this up. So he says, "Oh, it's nice to run into you." And I, say, "I'm sorry, excuse me."

That's it. Dang it, Cana, you can do better. In fact, I have done better. Remind me to tell the story about Mario Andretti and his bottle of wine sometime.

Define passionate?

Does being passionate about something mean you have to be knowledgeable and capable?

When I think about the people I consider to be passionate, they all have one thing in common. They are all extremely knowledgeable about their specific interest or hobby they're passionate about.

I'm not an expert on anything. I have interest in many things. I like horses, but I don't know anything about them. I like to read, but I can't quote Dostoyevsky. I like stained glass, and even know how to use a soldering iron, but I'm no expert craftsman. I like cars, I like to watch racing, go to car shows and auctions. One of my favorite past times is to just ride in the car with my fiance while we drive around looking at cars. But when it comes decoding VIN tags, rebuilding an engine, or even discussing the history of a certain marque at length, I'm not your girl. But I could be.

I'm just an average person with average talents. I've always accepted the fact I'm just not a passionate person. But I've reached a point where I don't want to just coast anymore. Until now I've been driving down the center line of life. It's time to find out if I'm capable of more.