Third-degree burns to his face and head did not stop Chris Ollom from granting 18-year-old Damian Taylor’s wish. It had just been a few weeks after Ollom had been in an explosion at his Automotive Experts of Kent/Covington, when he was approached by the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

Taylor bought a ’73 Chevy Malibu with intentions of restoring it, except a few obstacles made it nearly impossible to do. Taylor has been living with a life-threatening cardiac condition. He has had 23 surgeries and will need a heart transplant. He applied for his wish when he was just 17-years-old but the foundation could not find someone to restore his car, until six months or so went by and they eventually found Ollom.

Ollom has had a love of cars and restoring them since he first restored a car when he was just 15 years old, he said. One of his neighbors had a car he kept begging day after day to let him buy. His neighbor finally gave in and sold him the car. Ollom spent his own money and sweat to restore the car. He pushed it to his high school so he could work on it everyday, he said. His hard work paid off when he participated in a few car shows. His love of cars has continued all these years.

“When I heard about Damien, I jumped on the opportunity,” Ollom said.

He felt so grateful that the outcome of the explosion was not worse. Instead of being down and negative about the explosion, Taylor took it as a positive thing. Ollom could not pass up the opportunity to help someone that was going through a life-threatening condition, he said.

“I believe that everything happens for a reason, and this came up at the perfect time,” Ollom said. “I really feel like I was destined to do this.”

Hearing about Taylor’s passion for cars reminded Ollom of his own passion and he wanted to grant his wish. Restoring a car is usually a big project, taking anywhere from one to two years. But Ollom, with the help of some volunteers and donors was able to restore the car in a little over eight weeks.

Ollom’s first obstacle was trying to find the parts for the car, which were nearly impossible,he said. Eventually, his brother called him about a car that was for sale in Sedro-Woolley. He called about the car and the owner said the car had been sitting there unused for the past 19 years. It had belonged to their son who had died. Once they heard what Ollom needed the car for, they decided to donate the car, Ollom said. They thought it was meant to be, they were giving this car who had belonged to their son, to someone living with a life-threatening condition.

The donated car saved Ollom, he got most of the parts for the car from the donated car. After working day and night on the car for a few months, Ollom couldn’t wait to give the car to Taylor.

On Friday, July 29, everyone involved in the project decided to give Taylor the biggest surprise of his life. Taylor thought he was meeting with Ollom to pick some paint samples, when really, the car was already finished. Ollom is best known for his work on classic cars, so he invited people he knew with classic cars to surprise Taylor with his own car show.

Classic cars were lined up in the parking lot of his shop, with everyone anxiously awaiting Taylor’s arrival. Taylor arrived with his family and was speechless when he saw everything that was there for him. After presenting Taylor with the car, some gifts and a book with about 100 pages worth of pictures from the project, traffic was stopped for a short time to let all of the classic cars go the Wal-Mart parking lot in Covington where they were going to join other cars for Taylor’s private car show.

Ollom said this was one of the best experiences he has ever had; he was able to make someone’s wish come true.