A Lesson in Loud Noises: The Day the Engine Exploded

Let me share a story that might help. This happened sometime after the Gulf War—probably around 1991. I was in 6th grade or maybe heading into 7th during the summer. My parents only had one vehicle back then, a gigantic 1981 Ford Granada, a two-door car that felt more like a tugboat on wheels.  

On this particular day, my mom had the car, so I think it must have been payday. Her routine on payday was to drive an hour to my dad's workplace, meet him at the gate to grab his paycheck, cash it, pay bills, buy groceries, and then either pick him up or let him carpool home.  

We were about five minutes away from the apartment we lived in when we pulled into a gas station. She sent me inside to pay for gas. I was halfway to the store when it happened—*BAM!* It was a deafening sound, like a gunshot or an explosion.  

And let me tell you, 99.9% of the people at that gas station, both outside and inside, hit the ground immediately—including me. Even as a kid, I could tell a lot of those people were military veterans. You could see it in the way they instinctively dropped to the ground like they’d been trained to do.  

What about me? Well, I wasn’t exactly new to loud noises either. My dad was a combat veteran who taught me how to hunt before I could even tie my shoes or ride a bike. But let’s be real—at that moment, instincts kicked in, and I joined the crowd, kissing that dirty concrete right alongside them.  

So what caused the noise, you ask? It wasn’t a gunshot or an explosion—it was just some part of our car’s engine deciding to give up on life in a very dramatic fashion.  

The lesson? Don’t feel bad if loud noises like a nail gun freak you out. They get me too! I still remember that moment vividly—lying on the concrete as a 6th grader, thinking something big was going down, surrounded by a surprising number of veterans at a random gas station.