Ryan Boren - NorthStar’s Car Enthusiast

By Tirzah Hopkins

Ryan Boren is a freshman from Phoenix, Arizona, and a great lover of cars. His favorite type of car is a Porsche but he also really likes Pontiacs because, “I like Pontiac because I own a Pontiac muscle car my grandfather gave me when he passed.”

But Ryan’s love of cars goes deeper than many. His grandfather, Duane Clark (1950-2019), was the main reason he’s so into cars. When asked if he’d always been interested in them, he said, “My grandfather would always teach me about cars when I was little because my mom was in college for 8 years, and my dad divorced my mom, so I spent all my time over there. Like when I was 2-7 to 8ish.”

For Ryan, loving and working on cars was often a family thing. Once, he helped his grandfather and great-grandfather build an engine. He said, “I barely did much. It was more watching and learning and them telling me about this or that.” He says that currently, he’s about average or just above average mechanically. He says that being able to change a tire would be a beginner skill-level because it’s something you need to know. He said that average or just about average would be being able to change the oil by yourself, which he’s currently learning to do.

His grandfather was a very big part of his life, and a really great person. When asked about him, Ryan said, “Well, he knows about cars. He’s owned multiple muscle cars in his life. He was a pastor of a church that had super nice people, he never ate pork following the commandment in the Bible that he still believed in, and he was super cool. He never got mad. He was always super kind to anyone. No matter what.”

“That last one is my grandfather's ashes just so people know who he is he deserves it.” -Ryan

This is Ryan’s first year at NorthStar. He said he joined because he didn’t care for physical school and it wasn’t his learning style. He says that NorthStar’s a great fit now. After high school, he plans on taking trucking school and mechanical school so that he can do cross-state trucking. When asked about Teams he said, “Teams is awesome. I only interact with the Memes and the High School General but it’s really fun. I got suspended like my first week in because I forgot this is school and not social media, so the slang needed to chill a bit so yeah..... ” Despite that, he still enjoys Teams and NSA.

Ryan’s beginnings certainly seemed rough, but he had an amazing grandfather that taught him to love cars and was a great example to him. Ryan was lucky to have someone in his life like that, who was wise and loved him and wanted to teach him. We should all have someone like that. Sometimes you have to go looking for them, but it’s worth it and will really help our development into adults.

Tirzah Hopkins has been at NSA for about two years. She lives in Indiana, USA with eight of her eleven siblings and mom and dad. She has recently started writing for the Navigator. She enjoys spending time with family, hiking, karate, writing, and playing with babies.