It was Thursday, October 20, 1960
It was Thursday, October 20, 1960. My heart had been racing from the time that my father finally gave in and gave his permission for my life to be permanently linked to my love. A beautiful Austrian 1960 PUCH moped. I could not contain myself that entire day in school. I knew that as soon as I got home, it would be waiting for me after my brother rode it home from the Havana dealer. I counted the seconds until the final school bell finally rang at 4:30 PM. I don’t think that my feet even touched the ground as I ran home- the Cuban track and field Olympic team would have recruited me on the spot had they seen me flying by. I remember one of our neighbors calling out to me wondering if something was wrong….Now I’m home- something is wrong !!…I am frantically calling everyone’s names. Grandma Linde is saying–“este muchacho esta loco “. My beautiful Austrian is nowhere. I look at Grandpa Linde and he just shrugged his shoulders. For the next 3 hours- I am pacing up and down breathing into a brown paper bag ( OK, I’m embellishing a bit for effect )- I couldn’t eat dinner and am on a sugar high . Too many Cawi’s and Ironbeers (relax- Cuban sodas). Finally at exactly 8:43 PM (still embellishing)- WWRRrrooomm wrooom-pop pop pop fssstt. Eyes popping out of sockets, screams ( ahem..manly not girly), propeller arms, huge vertical jumps- you get the idea. Me…running around that wine red colored holy grail of the metal world. I can still smell the new paint. Then this- “DONDE C*** ESTABAS” or roughly ” Where the #*^##* were you” oh oh- Grandma Linde is listening- so off to bed I go without dinner and having to wait one more day for my (not so ) virginal ride. The story…Armando decided that it was only fitting for Idalia and Genaro to see the moped first- only one problem, they lived in Guanajay- a two hour moped ride west of Havana, in a different province. By the way- our home town Guanabo is east of Havana, as far east from the capital as Guanajay is west- being close in name doesn’t make it close in distance. Nice huh…but wait there’s more. To get to Guanajay, you need to ride through the old Cuban central highway, a one lane each way- speed limit 90 KPH, cars, big trucks, etc.. The top speed of a 1960 Puch is 60 KPH with the wind on your back. Do the math. Nice way to kill yourself and my moped or at best, a not yet broken-in moped engine. Ah- how blissful it is to be 17 and adventuring. That redhead and I were inseparable soul mates, it was a good thing that it wasn’t around when Hurricane Donna hit Guanabo a month earlier and the Marina de Guerra (Cuban Navy) evacuated everyone to high ground as the storm surge moved the sea ashore. They would have had to pry my hands from it. I last saw it February 20, 1962 when I left for the US. Grandpa Linde received many offers to buy it from the town people but refused since he was saving it for me to have again upon my return home. After Grandma and Granpa Linde came to join us in the US, December 1966, it remained behind along with all my things (except for something that I recovered through Ebay, of old things, last year). I have a gut feeling that whoever grabbed it, is still taking good care of it. It will be mine again when I go back home. The moral of the story -Pay shipping for your moped and keep it away from your brother. :)