Regardless of what number of years have handed, you certainly keep in mind the combination of feelings whenever you first acquired your driver’s license.
For some, it was an keen pleasure; for others, a candy launch. Perhaps there was some nervous anticipation within the air as nicely. However no matter how comfy or assured you have been behind the wheel as a brand-new driver, securing that license meant one factor for all of us: freedom.
The power not simply to drive however to journey locations. To get away. To go anyplace, anytime, and to create all of the experiences that include it. That’s one thing you don’t neglect.
Like many, I spent the primary week after getting my license cautiously driving to high school and over to my then-girlfriend’s place within the household mini-van – a barely embarrassing Toyota Sienna.
However videographer Mark Vasilyuk – AKA Skuraweekly – took a a lot cooler route. Proper after passing his driving checks, Mark took his Nissan S14 challenge automotive 2,000 miles from Washington State to Southern California (and again once more, hopefully). Alongside for the journey was his older brother Ruvim, who drove a JDM S13.
How might a barely 16-year-old afford such a challenge, you would possibly marvel? Effectively, Mark had been arduous at work taking pictures and modifying movies since earlier than he was a teen. By the point he was 12, he had a particular exemption to shoot movies at his native drift monitor, creating content material for mates and ultimately purchasers nicely earlier than he might even drive.
“I grew up in a household of 14 [not a typo], so we by no means traveled in any respect. One of many issues that drove me to get into videography was that it was a option to journey and have new experiences. The primary time I flew on a airplane, it was for work. I all the time needed my work to take me out of my consolation zone,” Mark says.
This work led to Mark producing one among Kansei Wheels’ early promotional movies, which featured Ruvim’s S13. The video was proven on the SEMA Present that yr, and the connection with Kansei continued from there. The corporate later invited Mark and Ruvim to showcase their automobiles at a drift occasion in Southern California at Apple Valley Speedway (or ‘The Grange,’ because it was identified again then).
So, when the time got here, Mark’s S14 – slammed on coilovers and rocking some Kansei wheels – was prepared for its first main journey. It simply wanted a driver. Or, extra particularly, one with a license. Mere days after that milestone was achieved, it was highway journey time.
A quick disclaimer: These images are almost seven years outdated, so Mark is now nicely into his twenties. However I just lately stumbled throughout these photographs and felt compelled to revisit them.
Not as a result of the automobiles or the story are notably distinctive however as a result of they mirror one thing common. The early days of driving are formative, and extra importantly, they’re shared experiences. However we don’t all the time notice that on the time.
From The Archive
So, Mark set out from Washington with Ruvim, the extra mechanically inclined of the pair. It was Ruvim who had been instrumental in educating Mark wrench on his automotive within the years and months main as much as his youthful brother getting his license.
In fact, this dynamic introduced them nearer, too. “Automobiles are what united us. You will have the same old fights as younger siblings, you develop up, and then you definately discover frequent floor. For us, it was automobiles,” Mark shares.
This was their first highway journey of this magnitude, and for Mark, it was the primary massive journey the place bills have been lined by a shopper.
The drive was fueled principally by Cheetos and Crimson Bull, so a ham and egg breakfast from my native diner felt like a luxurious after hours on the highway. Afterward, we cruised out to the seaside and hit one among my all-time favourite backroads earlier than Mark and Ruvim continued their journey south.
I’ll always remember driving Mark’s S14 that day or how excited he was in regards to the automotive and attending to share it with me. However past that, I had a front-row seat to one thing a lot larger: Mark’s world was increasing exponentially, all because of the privilege of driving.
It’s simple to take as a right whenever you’ve been driving for years, however moments like that remind you that one thing so simple as getting behind the wheel can nonetheless really feel like a life-changing expertise. Years later, Mark says he and Ruvim nonetheless discuss that journey.
“Ruvim has moved a couple of hours away to Seattle, and we’re each married now, so we don’t get to see one another that always. These are the phases of brotherly relationships… we by no means realized on the time how cool that chance was. Wanting again on the journey, it was simply good occasions,” Mark says.
So, the following time you set out on a highway journey or cruise down a again highway, take a second to understand it. Expertise it absolutely. You by no means know, you would possibly simply be making one among your finest recollections but.
Trevor Ryan
Instagram: purposebuilt_trevor
www.purposebuilt.media
