Grampo, Canutito ‘se hallan un’ lowrider car
Canutito was helping Grampo Caralampio sacar un bonche de hierbas that had overgrown la yarda detrás de la casa. The weeds estaban tan grandes que Canutito remarked que there could easily be un elefante escondido underneath all of them. Grampo looked surprised cuando de repente he struck algo grande y duro entre todo el hierbero. “M’hijo,” he said to Canutito, “you may have been right all along; Parece que there is something huge and hard como un elephant hiding among all of these weeds.”
As they continued to pull out montones y montones de hierbas, algo bien estraño started to emerge from them. It looked como un carro muy viejo con los fenders pintãos with flames of fire shooting out detrás de los fenders. También tenía una Señora de Guadalupe en el hood del carro y una steering wheel hecha de chain links fused todos juntos. Grampo looked at it and exclaimed: “I’ll be darned! ¡Mira lo que hallé aquí!”
“What is it, grampo?” Canutito asked him, mirando a los guardabarros que tenían llamas de fuego, con poco miedo. “¿Puede ser una bomba atómica o un flying saucer?”
“No, m’hijo,” grampo replied. “It isn’t an atomic bomb ni un platillo volador; es un lowrider car como el que I used to own, cuando era joven.”
“I’ve never heard de los lowrider cars, grampo,” Canutito said. “Were they called ‘lowriders’ porque their butts were dragging en la tierra como un baby wearing un pañal mojão whenever the diaper is soggy?”
“You are not too far de la verdad, m’hijo,” Grampo Caralampio said. “Les llamaban lowriders porque they were set bien cerca del camino pero tenían hydraulics that would pick them up de vez en cuando and lean them forward como un pinacate, shooting sparks por el bumper de atrás. Las sopandas hidrólicas would get a real workout.”
“They sound bien suaves, grampo!” Canutito exclaimed, trying to imagine a los carros going up and down en hydraulic springs. “¿Quién hacía esos low-riders?”
“They were made de las souped-up parts de carros viejos that had been pieced together por los vatos locos. The lowrider cars were then sanded down y pintãos con fancy designs como Nuestro Señora de Guadalupe or sometimes hasta con una mona empelota.”
“I would have liked to see Our Lady of Guadalupe en el capo de mi carro,” Canutito remarked, “pero I don’t think I would want to have a naked lady on it. By the way, how else did los ‘crazy dudes’ fix up sus lowriders, grampo?” Canutito asked him.
“Well, a veces they would hang un rosario bien shiney del rearview mirror o también los decoraban con un par de oversized, fuzzy dice. It wasn’t too uncommon de ver que a veces los vatos locos would also hang fuzzy bolitas de cherries all along el para brisas,” grampo replied, as he tried to imagine un lowrider todo fregón.
“¿Uh, grampo,” Canutito stammered, “qué es un ‘para brisas’?” “Ése era un ‘windshield’ que a veces estaba tinted a dark color para que los cops couldn’t look inside del lowrider muy fácil,” grampo said.
“I see que los lowriders también tenían un radio en ellos,” Canutito remarked.
“You better believe it,” grampo said. “En el radio escuchábamos las canciones del Freddy Fender como ‘Wasted days and wasted nights’.” As he was saying that, Grampo Caralampio puso las hierbas grandes back over the car and he let the past stay buried …