Remembering that mustard car

My niece Tammy and I were doing our regular dragging main on a beautiful April Sunday evening back in 1989.

Who couldn't spot this little yellow mustard-looking sports car? I took a glance at the handsome driver wearing these cool-looking Ray-Ban sunglasses. It was love at first sight.

We honked and waved at each other. I was so full of butterflies. After a couple cruises he disappeared and I didn't see him again.

I was sad. Where did this little yellow car go? Where was he from? Who is he? All these questions ran through my mind.

The following weekend was definitely on my agenda to head down Main Street and locate this little yellow sports car. I remember spotting it about to pass us when I got a glance at the driver and he gave me the biggest smile.

Then before I knew it he waved at us to pull over.

I remember the excitement till this day when he introduced himself as Todd Holt and his passenger as his best friend Ross Hillock. They were both from Clovis working in Alamogordo.

We exchanged our (landline) numbers.

A few days into the week, I received a call from Todd asking me out on a date. On May 4, he picked me up in his little yellow sports car - a Conquest is what I found out it was.

A year later, we were married.

This past May 5 Cinco de Mayo was our 30th wedding anniversary.

Our anniversary celebration we had planned was canceled due to the COVID-19. So our kids Dallas, Kyle and Brittany, and our grandson Kamdyn, celebrated with us eating pizza. That's what we ate on our first date.

Thanks to our dragging days on Main Street I met the love of my life, and my life of my love.

We've enjoyed over the years sharing our Main Street dragging stories with our kids. They grew up calling Main Street the brick road due to all the parades they have attended.

Todd and I have yet to miss the yearly Clovis Draggin' Main event. So many great memories ...

- Rebecca Martinez Holt, Clovis

Soulmate in a blue low-rider

January 1994, I was 18 years old and was dragging Main with my friend Sandy. She had Dallas Cowboys boxers on her head.

We passed by a blue low-rider truck and I yelled at them thinking one of the guys in the back of the truck was a guy I went to school with. I told them to pull over at McDonald's.

The guy in the back turned out to be the guy's brother that I was thinking of. The driver got out of the truck and I was immediately mesmerized with his blue eyes. I told him that I liked the bass in his truck and he borrowed a CD from me. I told him where I lived and a few days later he came to my house to return the CD.

We started dating and three years later we were married. We are still together today, married 23 years, and still living in Clovis.

Had it not have been for draggin' Main, I would have never met my soulmate.

- Andrea Bell, Clovis

Um, yeah, we went to church

When we were in our teenage years, a group of us snuck out of church and left in one of the girls' grandmother's huge green car. We went to cruise Main Street and thought we'd be fine.

Well, we were cruising in the inside lane going southbound in front of the courthouse area when all of a sudden, the car died on us.

We were all sooo embarrassed; one of the girls in the front seat jumped to the back to hide on the floorboard.

We sat there with traffic having to go around us and looking at us like we were crazy.

One of the girls had to ask some boys to help push the car out of the way. And since it was an older model car, it was so heavy to push.

We got it out of the way and tried starting it again. After a few tries we got it to turn over and we rushed back to church with nobody noticing we were gone.

I'll never forget that night. And all of us are still good friends to this day.

- Virginia Herrera, Clovis

After crash, ready for a cruise

Back in May of 2019, during my first year of summer after finishing my junior year of high school, someone pulled out in front of me leaving Taco Box and completely totaled my 1998 Chevy Silverado.

This truck meant a lot to me as it was my dad's truck in high school and the one I learned to drive in, and ever since, cars have been my biggest hobby.

After we went through the process of insurance paperwork and all the other hoops you have to jump through after an accident, I made the decision that I couldn't get another vehicle and that I wanted to rebuild it.

Since Draggin' Main was less than a month away, that meant that I had just that amount of time to rebuild an entire front clip of my truck, which I have never done on any vehicle before.

Waking up at sunrise and not going inside until sunset, day after day, working as hard as I could and making trips to scrap yards in search for doors, radiator mounts and other parts needed to drive my truck again, about a week before Draggin' Main I got the truck back up and going. The only thing missing was a new set of wheels.

I was so excited that it was drivable again that before I even got to put all of my tools up for the night, I drove it around the block with both windows down, jamming out to the Metallica CD that was left in the faceplate from the crash.

During the following days, the festival crept up and I eventually got my wheels mounted and was good to go for the gearhead gathering and most importantly the drag itself. Through all the doubts and struggles me and my family went through while trying to beat the clock, it was all worth it on the night of the drag when I could finally sit back, relax, and enjoy myself and all the hard work and sunburns I went through to get here.

I am currently a senior of the class of 2020 and due to all the events in the world today, I have gotten to polish up all the fine details in the truck and it is in better shape than I would have ever even imagined during last summer.

- Hayden Peel, Clovis

The people came from all over

Dragging Main helped some of my best teenage memories. It was something my parents did and even my grandparents did.

I can't count the stories I know about people my age who are married now who met while dragging Main.

Cops and parents never had to look hard to find us - we were all in one place.

There were boys of course who showed out racing. There were girls who fought because their boyfriend had some girl with him. But mostly it was just normal teenage fun.

There were people who came from Muleshoe, Friona, Melrose ... all sorts of places. That was like the "main attraction" here.

It was a right of passage so to speak. We couldn't wait to get to an age our parents would let us go. We anticipated even more getting our license so we didn't have to ride shotgun anymore with the friend who always went home early.

There were many love stories that began there including my parents'. My generation and the generations before me had countless happy memories of cruising Main.

Our parents could easily blend in with traffic to drive by and check on us to make sure we were with who we were supposed to be with and not doing anything more.

It's sad that my children didn't get to have this experience. Those are memories I wouldn't trade for anything in the world.

- Christine Gallegos, Clovis

Four lanes and a mushed flip flop

Back in the day, we used to drag Main Street when you had four lanes all the way up to the railroad tracks at the end of Main where we turned around to go right back up the street.

My high school friends, my new husband and I would ride our motorcycles in shorts and flip flops. (I know, stupid kids.)

This was back in the day when the jail was at the top of the courthouse. The prisoners could see down and, if I remember right, windows were open and they would yell down at us. We of course, being young and stupid, would yell back and wave.

My friend lost her flip flop once and we couldn't stop right away. We had to go around the block to try and retrieve it in the crowd of cars. It was mushed, but wearable and now looking "road worn." This was probably 41 years ago. That's a Main Street memory that I have.

- Sharon White, Clovis

If I could turn back time ...

When I was a kid I would come from Texas just to cruise, park and watch the cars. It was packed.

Those were the days - peaceful, no trouble.

How I wish I could turn back time.

- Oralia Gonzalez, Clovis