American Outlaw - Jesse James [119]
What the hell do I do now? I wondered.
At first, I figured the easy solution would be to spend all my time at West Coast; after all, we still had plenty of business to attend to. But dealing with the constant daily pressures of customers, crowds, and payroll stressed me out.
“I don’t know how I did this for so many years,” I admitted to Bill. “What the hell, man? We got thirty customers lined up to get their choppers, and every single one of them wants it now.”
I had never considered myself an artist, exactly, but I had to be in a certain mood to get my work done correctly. I had to have a certain clarity and focus, or the products I produced were going to be subpar and unremarkable. Simply put, I had to want to do it. And I felt that desire slackening.
“I used to really need to prove myself to everyone,” I explained to Sandy. “That’s what motivated me. But now I feel like I’ve proved myself. Making bikes is just not making me happy anymore.”
Sandy hugged me. As perceptive as she was, I’m sure she realized that my divorce from Monster Garage had left me feeling somewhat adrift. I also think she felt some mild guilt over her own stupendous career success. She was a sensitive, clued-in person, and she probably understood that no guy, no matter how generous he is, wants to be overshadowed by the woman he’s with. She wanted me to feel as confident about what I did as she felt about her acting, where she’d achieved so much.
“Well?” Sandy said, sympathetically. “What do you think we can do to make you feel alive again?”
I thought about it for a long time, but answers that important don’t just appear out of nowhere. I was looking around for passion, but couldn’t quite seem to find it.
Racing, however, had always been a kind of hobby of mine. Ever since I was a kid, I had always been a natural at driving at high speeds, whether it be boxcars or BMXs. As I got older, it had evolved to trucks, dragsters, and motorcycles, as well as to more novelty items, like dune buggies or off-road vehicles. With more time suddenly on my hands, I figured I could probably get a little more devoted to the sport, and have plenty of fun in the process.
With practice, I managed to gain some competence. I played around doing things like Figure 8 endurance racing, where you whipped around on the same track until you were dizzy, crossing in the middle; but what I loved most and found I was most talented at was stock car racing. It was so incredibly fast. It satisfied the part of me that lived for speed.
“Damn,” I laughed exultantly, after finishing one of my practice sessions, “why’d I even bother playing ball? This is so much cooler.”
In a matter of months, I’d managed to place myself into the Winston West series, a preliminary stock car race that took place at the Irwindale Speedway. Sandy, ever supportive, came out to cheer me on.
“Aren’t you nervous?” she asked. “I’m a little nervous.”
“No chance,” I said, patting my helmet. “This is going to be great.”
I started out sensationally, ripping out of the gate, in contention to place. But minutes into the race, my rear axle broke. My car careened out of control, and I crashed head-on into the wall at 140 miles an hour.
It was an awful, gory wreck. The dash collapsed into my face and broke my helmet, nose, and cheek. I shattered my ankle, spiral-fractured my tibia, cracked my sternum. The car was completely destroyed, and when I woke up, I found myself in an ambulance, covered with blood.
“Where I am?” I managed to mumble.
“Oh my God, you’re alive!” Sandy cried. “He’s alive!”
Though I hadn’t realized it at the time, I’d been unconscious for more than six minutes. It had been the chaplain who had gone and fetched Sandy—they hadn’t thought I was going to wake up.
As I lay there on the gurney in the ambulance, my vision distorted, my face covered in blood, Sandy reached out and gently touched my hand. She was trembling, just super shaky. I still remember the look that was on her face.