The goal seemed simple enough: to have a truck like most of my peers. Being born and raised in Tucson, it seemed ingrained that boys had trucks, girls had cars. This axiom of existence in Arizona was only reinforced by my parents who had two vehicles. The car for Mom and the pickup for dad.

After I became old enough to drive, I yearned for a truck, Not any just any truck, but a four wheel drive. Tucson in the 1970's still had miles of dirt roads. The only access, it seemed was to some for of 4WD vehicle.

My early college was at the Colorado School of Mines, in Golden Colorado - 4WD heaven. This exposure just reinforced my desires. But the reality of trying to put myself through school wend against the grain of my objective, so a truck would have to wait.

Due to financial problems, I left Colorado and returned to my home in Tucson to attend the University of Arizona. My parents assisted me in obtaining an automobile. But as luck would have it, it turned out to be a car, not a truck. This was OK for a while, because it was my first car. Then I met Ralph Bell. Ralph was one of those people you hear stories about. Son of a dairy farmer and an agriculture major, Ralph was a true lady's man. Very handsome and a smooth talker, he never had any trouble getting the coeds to do the horizontal bop. I guess in a sense, Ralph was my idol due to his ability to get laid at will. Ralph and I roomed together for a while in a condo near campus. Ralph worked nights as a bartender at the Smuggler's Inn. He would come in hours after the bar had closed with a new babe each night. My sport used to be to get up early enough to wait in the living room to see who (or what - Ralph could be less than discriminating sometimes) would come out of his bedroom in the morning. It was great fun! The women would sneak out of his bedroom naked, with their clothes in their hands trying not to wake him only to find me sitting on the couch with a cup of coffee, smiling and saying "don't worry, he's a sound sleeper. He never wakes up when they leave".

Ralph burned a permanent spot in my heart when he went and bought a brand new 1975 Chevy Blazer. What a hunk of iron! 350 cubic inch V8, 4 speed transmission, deluxe interior, stereo tape player. Love at first sight! But way out of my price range.

Ralph took me for my first "real" off road ride late one afternoon in 1975. We went to the hills on the north side of town where was going to show me "what the truck would do". Well he did. We were hauling ass up and down the hills as fast as that big V8 would take us until we encountered a small obstacle. I seemed that this area had been both used and abused by four wheelers before. Consequently, some poor, misguided soul had taken a back hoe and dug a series of 3 foot wide, 4 foot deep trenches across the hill side. The purpose was, of course, to stop folks from doing just what Ralph and I were doing. During the first 45 minutes or so of our adventure, we were lucky enough to not have encountered one of these thinly disguised tank traps. However, out luck ran out.

Ralph was shooting up the hill, petal to the metal, we caught good air at the top. Now, on the down slope side and going well over 40 mile an hour we both saw it at the same time. Oh Shit! He locks up the wheels but we're going too fast. Impact was intense. I'm glad I had my seat belt on, because we hid hard. The good news was we hit the trench perpendicular to the long axis. the bad news was both wheels were in the hole. Ralph was furious!. Screaming and cussing, he threw the truck in reverse and dumped the clutch. Lots of paint was lost from the rocks the rear tires were shooting toward the cab. Finally, he got us free, but not without damaging the front axle. Needless to say, my view of four wheeling had mellowed just a bit. But lessons are hard learned. In fact, to quote an old boss of mine, Jim Palmer: "You can't tell people shit". Translated, this means that experience, not words, is the best teacher.

Despite the damage to Ralph's truck, and ego, I had to admit the high speed trips up and down the hills were thrilling. A pure adrenaline rush. One that I sought to repeat, perhaps with my own truck if luck was with me