How I met Mr. BillyBobcat

[MrsBillyBobcat]

It was Friday, April 15th, "tax day", just like today. I left work late that night. I was a manager at Pearle Vision and I often stayed late to make the glasses. I drove to the Post Office to mail my tax return, then headed to Gratiot Avenue to make a few passes before calling it a night. Driving was (and still is) my favorite way to "wind down". As I was heading south near 14 Mile, a silver Grand Prix 2+2 caught my eye as it turned onto Gratiot. When the car came up along-side mine, I glanced over at the guy driving it (little did I know at the time that I was starring into the eyes of my future husband!). A couple miles down the road, we ended up stopped next to each other at the light. When I looked over at him, he said "nice car!" (I was driving a Buick Grand National), to which I replied "thank you". He then blurted out a pick-up line that not only caught me by surprise, but really got my attention! He said "if you ever need any work done, I work at Welburn Buick".

When the light changed, he entered a turn-around and headed north. Still a little stunned from what just happened, I thought to myself "WOW! He seems like a nice guy". Then I thought "what am I doing! I need to find that guy!" I turned around at the very next turn-around and headed north, looking for him as I drove. Just when I was about to give up, I passed by a bunch of cars, and there he was stopped at the light. I pulled up next to him and we began talking. He invited me back to his house (just off Gratiot) where we dropped off my car and went back out in his. We ended up driving around and talking (really!) until about 3 am. We found out that we had a lot in common, especially our love of cars. He asked for my phone number, but also let me know that he would be home working on his car that weekend if I wanted to stop by. So that Sunday, I took the T-tops off and headed out to Gratiot to see if I could find his house. I did, and he was in the garage. He was in the engine compartment (literally) of his ’62 Catalina. He had the motor out of it at the time. We chatted for a while, and went out to lunch.

We began dating after that, and were married a year and a half later at his church, which just happened to be on Gratiot. When the pastor mentioned (much to our surprise) that we met "on Gratiot as we passed each other" during our ceremony, everyone chuckled. We left the church and cruised Gratiot in a 1960 Cadillac Limo followed by a procession of classic Pontiacs.

In 1999, we opened an automotive collectible store on Gratiot just south of 14 Mile, almost exactly where I first saw Bill’s face. When I was writing out the deposit check to the landlord, I realized it was Valentine’s Day, and exactly 10 years ago when Bill asked me to marry him while out cruising Gratiot. That’s right, we met, got engaged, got married and opened a store all on the SAME street!




Some side notes…

GRATIOT (pronounced "gra-sh*t" ) is a cruise strip similar to Woodward.

Bill bought me a diamond pendant one week after we met.

The letters in the word "GRATIOT" can be unscrambled to spell "GTO" & "RITA"

After all these years, I realize my instincts were right that night, Bill is a "nice guy".