I brought the car home to show my brother and mom; my dad stated he would have it towed to the impound yard. I decided it would not be a good idea to bring the car home again and found a storage unit. I began the restoration of my car in the storage unit. I found out real fast I was going to need lots of money to fix it up; so I found a job at NPD where I was able to get a discount on parts and make good money at the same time. I was also going in to 11th grade at the time and signed up for a vocational education program. I met Mr. Bondy (Mark Bondy) after the first semester of class and he let me bring my Mustang into school to work on. Unlike my father and most of my friends whom made fun of my car calling it a “rust bucket”, P. O. S. etc and told me to throw it out, Mr. Bondy helped me make my dream come true. He never gave up on me or my dream.

There is not one bolt on the car that has not been removed and replaced by me. Some of the things that I replaced and fixed on the car were: the trunk panel, tail light panel, LH&RH quarter panels, LH floor pan, deck lid, RH door, 4 front aprons, front strut cross member and the LH and RH fenders, I installed a new interior and painted the car myself. One of the hardest things I had to fix on the car was the roof. Someone had jumped on it before I owned it. The roof was concaved so far in that it was hitting the tops of the seats. I also found out that when I pulled the car out of the dirt, I bent the frame. The only way I could fix this was to pull the frame back into place; I chained the car to the floor and used a come along to pull it back into place. Since I was in an Auto body class, I was not allowed to work on engines or transmissions in class; so Mr. Bondy let me rebuild the engine and transmission for my Mustang on my lunch hours during school.

To sum it up, I spent 2 years, 11th and 12th grade, in a vocational education program during and after school restoring my dream car. If it wasn’t for my Mustang, I would have never graduated from high school or college. It kept me in line and my grades high enough so that I would have the privilege of working on it at school. In June of 2000, I graduated from high school. My dream car was done. At my graduation party my father allowed my Mustang at our house for the day. I was happy it was home. My dad, mom and brother were very proud of my accomplishment. One of the things that I remember most about my graduation party was that Mr. Bondy was the first guest to show up for the party. He must have been very proud of me.

I started college in 2001 in Tennessee and for the next three years the car did not move much. In 2003 I graduated from college; my mom and brother had a graduation party for me at my brother’s house and my Mustang was there sitting in the garage right were I had left it three years prior. In 2004, I bought my first house with my wife (girlfriend at the time) and the first thing that was moved into the four car garage was my Mustang. In 2006, my car was at my wedding. After my wife and I said our “I-dos”, we walked down the isle of the church and jumped in my car that was parked outside, and drove off. This year, 2007, I let my wife drive my car with out me in it. She was only going to drive the car up and down our street. After the first 5 minutes had passed of her not returning, I started to get scared. After 10 minutes, I started pacing up and down the drive way. About 15 minutes later she returned with a big smile on her face, I have a feeling that she will be driving my Mustang more often now. This was the first time I had seen my car driven down the road with out me in it. It looked cool!!!!

This car has been a big part in my life. Thank you, for letting me share my story with you.

John Michalek

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