by Mark Nikolewski

When I was about 7 years old, I was in the the Cub Scouts. That Spring I got out my trusty, dull Cub Scout pocket knife and began to whittle my official chunk of wood to make a car for my first Pinewood Derby.

Now my Dad will confess to not being much of a handyman–and even if he were, as a father of five kids he sometimes worked two jobs to support us–he didn’t have a lot of time for this kind of thing.

So operating under the assumption that all young kids were doing this by project by themselves–and not with their dad’s help–I gnawed away at the hunk of wood with my knife. It was tough going. I think I expected it to be more along the lines of what I know now to be balsa would: soft, light, and easy to carve.

Pushing my knife down the corners of the block, I found it impossible to control the cut. The blade was taken in the direction of the grain; it was like this piece of pine had a mind of its own. Not being a particularly diligent kid, I tired of that after about 20 minutes and moved onto something more familiar and a lot less challenging–like playing with my G.I. Joe action figures.

But alas, the day of the event did arrive. In a panick that Saturday morning, I doused that mangled piece of wood in dark blue model paint, slid the wheels onto the nail axles, hastily glued the wheel assemblies on, and set off by myself to the middle school I was later to attend–the car still wet from paint and Elmer’s school glue.

When I got there, I saw all the other Scouts had smooth, contoured, evenly spray-painted cars. Many of them with “concealed” fishing weights for added performance. “They’d cheated,” I thought. “Their dads did all the work!”

After taking a look at the insurmountable competition, I meandered off to another part of the schoolyard to play with friends who had also lost interest in the event. Probably since it had stopped being “their car” the minute their Dads took over.

A bit later, somebody called me when my car was up to race. I ran back just in time to see my creation roll down the track. About eighteen inches from the start, the two front wheels sank–stopping the car cold, even though it was on a 30 degree incline. The axles had given way from the weight of the car, the cause being the undried glue.

Folks laughed. Not cruelly, mind you. I laughed too, then wandered back to play with my pals again. A bit later, another friend ran up to me screaming “You’ve won something! You won a trophy!”

I came back to see my pathetic entry next to a gold trophy with the words “MOST UNUSUAL” engraved on it.

Looking back, I thought I had won it because my car gave everyone a good chuckle. But as years passed, I like to think that I got the trophy because I attempted to do something by myself. I’d failed. But I tried.

Since then I’ve become quite capable at building things. I have a decent shop set up in the garage and built a few Pinewood Derby cars–with a tiny bit of help–for my 7 year old son. But just like his dad before him, he built his own, too. When all three were done, he chose his for the race. He won 2nd place.

It seems a majority of American kids go through the Pinewood Derby right-of-passage. How’d your experience go? Did dad build yours? Did you take credit? Or did you go it alone like you were on a vision quest?

You can link to Mark’s website here.