Earth vs Engines (or Green vs Need4Speed)

EARTH VERSUS ENGINES




This will be quite the boring blog for most of you really, some wandering thoughts and internal ethical and moral dilemas I face. The story of why Shiva-X is obsessed with cars but has met a "Green" Girl...






This is piling up in my mind and has to get cycled out now, so I will just blab (blog?) out as much as I can while trying to stay on topic. I would like to get as many opinions on this as possible, whatever your view may be, so if you read this, post something! You started reading this blog either because of the word Earth or Engine, so you should have an opinion, lets hear it...


Most of you will not be able to handle this entire blog, if you don't read it all, don't comment! Thanks!


Lets start with the center of this problems and many others, my love of fast cars.


The main problem is, nothing motivates me more than Racing. I was 18 when I got my first car, a silver 1992 four cylinder Mustang LX hatchback with an automatic slushbox. It was wore out and weak, and nearly one of the worst examples of Fords great Mustang line-up, but I loved that car and hate myself to this day for selling it after wrecking it ( I could easily fix it these days and would be a fun project) but somehow that machine changed me in ways I could never have imagined at that time. Right then, the only technical thing I knew about cars was that they needed the oil changed every 3000 miles (but not how to do it), and how to put air in the tires. Thats it, no high shool auto mechanics class or anything. The Speed Effect suddenly had began, with my first car.

At this point, before things got too out of hand with the racing, I had considered myself an artist and thats about it. I lived in Fantasy land of my own creation, hiding in dark holes drawing, writing, doing things I loved which was fun, but, I have always had a part of me that craves an adrenaline rush like no other and from inside of me it was poking and prodding, trying to find a way out. It is, has been, many times in my past unstoppable; I can trace its existance through my history like a vien. Why did I do so many things for no apparent reason? Of course it wasn't all just for the rush, there was some greed, laziness, stubborness and many other factors in there, but a single problem persists and is continually trying to find an outlet. Why did I vandalize (I was bad) for no reason? Why did I steal ( I was real bad) when I didn't really need? Tried crazy drugs (to find out I hated most of them)? Learned to wrestle, fight, box and kickbox (and still want to learn Jiu Jitsu and Muay Thai)? Speeding exessively in cars, then modifying them to be even faster and speed even worse than before, weilding vehicular instruments of destruction on streets full of unaware, innocent people. Of course now its obvious. How do I turn this Adrenaline Switch off? What if I don't want to?

As the Speed Effect took its hold, I felt a thirst for knowledge like I have never felt before about any other thing, and it snowballed from that point on, speeding and racing got my blood pumping like no other thing I have ever felt or experienced. And since I could not afford to pay someone to do the labor on my mustangs, I was in control of the "art project" and could modify and customize the machine to my own personal taste, a habit that carries to every automobile I own, each to better fit its intended purpose of course, anyways I started hacking the shit out of every car I touched and tortured my parents with "look ma, I pulled my engine out of my car! And this one I bought for a few hundred bucks and it doesn't even run but it was a killer deal!" Then like a little kid with a new toy, I was occupied with dissmantling it all to see how it all works and eventually, with much help, get put back together again. Looking back, it was actually quite fun, but for the most part I just wanted to go fast, and learning how to do it all myself kept the costs down.



These days, I am the artist, the creator, modifying the machine into the form and funtion and image I want, with my own tools, knowledge, methods, and hands. I am a doctor, a "stang surgeon", bringing the engines, the hearts and projects to life with my own skills and resources. I am a movie star, rolling around in a fast, hot ride, I am an ego crusher on the street, the bully I never could be in high school because of my size. I am the skydiver or bungie jumper every time I get into the accelerator looking for that blurred, and perfectly balanced path, literally between life and death, a perfect, artistic, and flawless performance, or a choking, devastating loss. The possibilty for disaster creates awesome high energy experiences. Then, to survive upon pure skill, everything barely holding together but somehow it does, and then you cross that tightrope to victory and glory, that is pure fun to me. It is hard to accurately describe all the thoughts and emotions and aspects that I feel about the sweet elixir of racing and the total scope of my madness has yet been revealed even to me (just as I typed this, the song "Highway to the Danger Zone comes on muahaha), but those are a few of the crazy things I feel.

I've tried, as the author to get you SOME kind of perspective on how these shenanigans are a part of my life and, so far (because I am still alive and it has contributed to me having a much more fun time on this earth than most people) and that is why I will continue living in certain ways, but I can't fully explain the evolution, the Demonic Speed Possession that has taken place in the last few years, after countless projects and a few more stangs in the stable, and it has quickly "becometh me." I found myself at the end of last years (2006) racing season with a successful personal racing record, barely holding onto my liscence and I was employed as a High Performance Auto Technician. My whole life practically revolved around internal combustion engines. The terrible, wonderful, evil, awesome, dispicable, captivating, culprit of prophetic impending disaster, ENGINES! They are so awe inspiring to me I can't even begin to convey the severity of my madness. My current eco-crushing motor of choice, the all american Ford 302 cude V-8! Built by me and a buddy, I never thought about the Earth or the environment one single time while slaving over the car trying to bring the machine to life. But now, as I get older, I learn more and more about the environment and the "inconvenient truth" about our air and as I continue to live with my environmentally active girlfriend, I know that I want to divert things down certain courses, BUT HOW THE HELL am I gonna steer THIS damn ship? Race Car drivers cannot care for the Earth and the environment. Can they? Should I? Does it even matter? Will other racers respond to this, laugh, or even care? 43 views so far and nobody else has an opinion, hmmmm.



This is really just a philisophical look at this situation of mine that most other racers who read this will be like "what the hell is he talking about" and the environmentalists that read it will be like "this guy be crazy....."



I have a bunch of good ideas that I will detail in my next blog, my ideas of how I can begin my quest to lessen my ecological footprint, and still race mustangs. If you care, stay tuned...