New Bridge

Pat: So Robert, I found this picture among your collection of photos. It doesn't look very new but it's called new bridge. Why were you looking for this? What's the story behind the photograph?

Robert: New Bridge. Funny. Old now. Shut down, blocked off, taking three miles of Jersey shortcut to Salem with it. Last time I crossed, decade or so ago, a motorcyclist had just crashed on his exit. I was on a bike too. He had a compound fracture of his ankle. Didn’t want to see it up close. The paramedics were already there. I took the righthander to Quinton. It all brought back memories though.

A time when I was living on the absolute edge. Had a 440 Chrysler convertible with true duals and a Carter thermoquad carburetor, Koni shocks, and cop tires and metallic brakes. 4,000 pound car that could do zero to sixty in 7 seconds and a hundred in 10. Spent most of my time hanging out with the sociopath Will. I’d leave way after dark and drive 20 miles home in less than 20 minutes. New Bridge was the halfway point.

I’d hit it, as part of a long straightaway through the marshy nowhere, at 100 mph. The floor of the bridge consisted of wooden planks. You could hear them rippling upward under you as you passed. Bumpity-bumpity, bump. The bridge itself was a single lane wide, maybe two feet on either side of the Chrysler. I never slowed down. Usually, the radio was off, and I was listening not to the Stones but to the stereophonic exhaust of my duals and the gorgeous hrumm of my 440 V8. I always made it home. I wasn’t drinking then. The Chrysler convertible was enough for me then. And I didn’t die going home.