Keepsake die-cast prompts boy's memorable query

The late Art Linkletter was right.

Kids do say the darndest things.

My 4½-year-old grandson Sawyer Sherrill proves that almost daily.

But never before like last weekend when he and his mom, my daughter Heather Templeton, dropped by my condo in Mooresville, N.C.

When Sawyer visits, he loves to play with my collection of model race cars. He is welcome to the small die-casts, but not those of 1/24th-scale.

Oh, no! Not after accidentally knocking the left-front wheel off a black No. 3 Chevrolet a while back.

He can only look at the four of the 1/24ths I keep in a large curio cabinet in the living room.

Sawyer, a very precocious little fellow, was gazing intently at these cars when he asked an astonishing question.

"Pappy," quizzed Sawyer, pointing to a treasured keepsake, "does a girl drive this car?"

"No, son," I answered.

Sawyer's brown eyes widened in puzzlement.

"Then why does it have Hooters on it?"

Heather and I dropped to our knees, whooping with laughter.

Sawyer was pointing to a scaled-down version of an orange-and-white No. 7 Ford that the late Alan Kulwicki drove to NASCAR's 1992 Cup Series championship.

Just four months after taking the title in Atlanta, Kulwicki and three companions tragically lost their lives in the crash of a private plane on a cold April 1, 1993, while en route to a race at Bristol.

Painted on the model are logos of Kulwicki's sponsor, Hooters, the restaurant chain that features young women in scanty attire.

How did a 4½-year-old know about Hooters and figure the car might have "a girl driver?"

Heather smiled.

"I suspect that his daddy might have taken him to Hooters for lunch," she said.

And I suspect that somewhere, Alan – a driver and friend I admired – is amused and smiling at my grandson's "from the mouths of babes" inquiry.

Also, Alan is pleased, I know, that I've decided that someday the orange-and-white model car with the Hooters owl on the hood is going to be passed down to Sawyer.