It was the most fun I ever had. I promise.

We were in my grandfather's 1936 Ford car slowly bumping across the pasture when Peggy, my cousin who was 13, said she wanted to learn to drive.

I was only seven, but old enough to begin having misgivings right off when Bryan, our uncle, quickly agreed to teach her. For a 19-year-old, I thought he could be an old fuddy-duddy at times, however, I also knew he could be a daredevil.

The car was 9 years old and looked 30. It had hauled hay bales, hogs, and baby calves and been used to push-start everything from tractors to stubborn bulls. Wrecking it wasn't a worry. Evidently, neither was concern for life and limb.

From the back, standing on the hump in the floorboard, it looked to be a wild ride, so I grabbed hold of the front seat and hung on.

Once situated behind the steering wheel, the first thing she did was kill the engine. The first thing I did was get the giggles.

"Give it more gas," my uncle yelled over the roar of the motor. But she popped the clutch, killing it again. That move threw me down onto the back seat, from which I arose laughing and hoping she'd do it at least once more. She did.

"Let the clutch out slower," he shouted. That was easy, but she forgot to give it more gas. We bucked across that field as if we were bronc riders, me laughing harder with every bounce.

Here's where my misgivings proved insightful. When she got it started again, he stuck his foot on top of hers and on the gas pedal. Straight ahead we went like a shot.

She was screaming and begging him to take his foot away and I was giggling so hard I could hardly stand on my perch. Even Bryan was laughing.

The lesson the next day was the best of all, if only for the anticipation.

Lookin' back, I think my memories of that summer are so vivid because of the shared joy of those wild rides. And, too, it was the last summer the three of us got to spend that much time together.