Gary Lay was a lovable character with a good honest heart and a jovial carefree disposition. As fate would have it, all these blessings were offset by a curse. See, Gary had suffered an attack of polio in childhood, which had left him with one rather gamy left arm and leg. Still, his total acceptance of his own disability made it easy for his friends to treat him like any of the other knuckleheads in our church youth group – and we did! It was Gary who walked up to a group of us, deep in discussion about a childhood Dutch friend of mine called Yaap. Well Yaap did this – and Yaap did that – and often Yaap would do something else. In the quiet break of conversation, Gary stopped licking his ice cream for just one moment to innocently ask, “What’s a Yaap?” It was also Gary who when asked to take 6 inches off the height of a 4-legged table, did so by cutting the required 6 inches off each of 5 legs. Such was the enthusiastic approach he displayed for most activities presented to him. Now, like most lads his age, he sought to promote his growing manhood by the size of his toys. In his case it was the purchase of a huge V8 Rambler. The throaty rumbling sounds of his new car coming up the street foretold the arrival of one of the proudest yet cheekiest smiles in the church youth group. Now to watch Gary arrive in that car was one thing – to travel with him as the driver, was something else. Why Gary would buy a manual car with an on-the-column gear changer, considering his gamy left arm, is something I never bothered to asked him – I simply accepted it and made a point of never travelling with him to find out. Unfortunately on this particular day I had no choice. It was my time to experience the tip of horrors that was often the recount of so many others that had previously undertaken the journey. There was the story by Phil Peterson, that as Gary had planted his foot in an attempt to turn quickly through and around the gap in a traffic island, he got his gamy arm caught in the steering wheel and they found themselves back at where they started. They had completed the full circle back over the concrete centre island. Well my trip this day began ok, except for the unnerving way in which Gary would want to look at you to see your reaction to the issues he was raising in conversation. I don’t know why he bothered, because my reaction to whatever issue he was raising was the same. My face reflected a look of fear as I stared transfixed on the dangers that lay before us on the road ahead. Another of the downsides of owning a V8 was the issue that it could pass everything on the road except for a petrol station. Well Gary’s gas guzzling car was no exception. He knew on this particular day that his gas was low, but in typical Gary style, he attempted to get as far as he could without having to add any petrol. So the tense journey continued right up until the moment that he decided to overtake a taxi – his car’s engine spluttered and coughed like a V8 that had just run out of fuel. So, there we were on the wrong side of the road being undertaken by a rather perplexed taxi driver on the inside due to our reducing momentum and cursing there silently in some unreal twilight zone. “There – a petrol station” says Gary as we swerve behind the now very confused taxi driver and arrive at some speed in the driveway. Gary’s mind was a whirl, whilst the fear in my mind was very sharp and focused – hang on tight, don’t move a muscle, the nightmare will end soon. CRASH!! The Gary special arm and the leg all played their part in ensuring that the V8 ended up running into the bouser with a deafening crunch. I still was not moving – I was convinced that rigor-mortise had definitely set in. As Gary took his foot of the brake the car rolled back from the now 45 degree bent over petrol bouser. My peripheral vision again saw Gary’s anxious face turn to me and ask, “Do you think they will notice”.
