When I was in law school, my favorite professor was this salty old man who taught me contracts in my first year. He was really cynical and spoke his mind and I took every class that he taught while I was there.
Every year, one of the student organizations would have an auction to raise money for their activities. They solicited donations from the faculty of their time to spend with a student in some activity like tennis, lunch, or, like I bought one year, a ride on their 40 foot sailboat.
My favorite professor always donated a ride with him in his Porsche to lunch and back. He called his Porsche "Hester" because she was a "red S" which reminded him of the character "Hester Prynne" from Nathanial Hawthorne's "the Scarlet Letter." I was the high bidder on that item for each of the three years I went to that school. The last year, he let me drive home.
After I graduated, I visited with him in his office on campus a couple of times. My wife and his wife exchanged Christmas cards every year but, other than that, we didn't have much contact.
Last year, I was thinking about my old professor so I sent him a letter inviting him to lunch. When he got my letter, he called me and said that he didn't get out much anymore but that my wife and I should come to his house for dinner. We accepted his invitation and had dinner one Sunday with him and his family.
After dinner, the professor took my wife out to the garage and lifted the cover on the Porsche for her. Before that, the last time that I had seen Hester was 1996.
As we were leaving, the professor suggested that we take the Porsche out for a drive sometime, with me driving, because he didn't drive anymore.
I did call him a few months later to follow up on his suggestion. There was no answer when I called so I left a message but no one ever called back. I
just let it go.
My professor died last month. I submitted something to the school newspaper for his obituary and attended the memorial service the law school held in his honor.
A few weeks later, I got a call from his son-in-law who told me that the family had decided that I should have Hester now. I offered to take the car and sell it for them but quickly got shot down. They didn't care about the money. They just wanted me to have the car.
So now I've got this 1970 911S. I've never paid any attention to Porsches. I did, however, work my way through college as an auto mechanic and I do all of my own auto maintenance and repair. I've been reading this board for awhile and I can tell that keeping Hester going is going to be expensive but money well spent.
