February 13th 2012 Cecil Helton

It’s the Journey, Not the Destination

I'm looking forward to many more weekends of working on the 944 with my son.

Spending the last month or so looking for my oldest child’s first car was an experience I don’t believe I’ll ever forget. We traveled hundreds of miles, and looked at hundreds of cars during the process.

We didn’t have a set list of requirements, other than the desire of my son to have something that would qualify as a “classic” or “antique” automobile – meaning that in general, we were looking for cars twenty-five years of age or more.

Alex wanted a car he termed as a “project.” He wanted the opportunity to work on restoring and making a car like-new again. And one that offered us the ability to work together on.

In the end, we ended up going with a Porsche 944 – which was one of my favorite cars when I was my son’s age. And it still is today, despite the march of time.

Being 28 years old, the 944 isn’t exactly in “perfect” condition. Not exactly the “project” Alex had defined, but still, plenty of things for us to work on and to restore. And I have to admit, my son’s idea of a project we could work on together was a great one.

We spent the vast majority of the weekend doing just that. We removed the seats and refurbished the tracks to make them move back and forth like they did from the factory. We rebuilt the windshield wiper motor. We got the non-functional rear window defroster working again. And as we worked, we made a list of what we’ll be tackling over the coming months.

And I’ve got to admit – I enjoyed myself thoroughly, and look forward to our future work sessions – so much so that I realized the journey we’ve embarked on with the car is the the thing I most value. Even though we have an end goal, it’s the steps we’re taking to get there that really matter, and that we’re doing it as a father-and-son team.