Cars

When I finished college and was about to get married, I bought my first car. Now I really felt independent. I bought a four-door 1956 Ford from Mr. Gould. It ran well except when you let up on the gas and were coasting down a hill, it would produce huge clouds of black smoke. I quickly learned to carry several cans of oil and frequently added it to the engine. It seemed about every two weeks, I would have to take it to Uncle Harry's garage, and he would patch it back together for the next two weeks. Finally, it got traded for a Nash Rambler, which worked just fine and didn't need to be in the garage on a regular basis. Jerry was a baby at the time, and while sitting in his child seat in the car, he could reach the shift and actually shifted the car, while in foward motion, to reverse. This had an unfortunate impact on the transmission, and we were back to the garage. It was maroon in color, and to this day I like to see cars of that color.

Maurice's family was growing, and they needed a larger car, so we traded the Rambler for their green Volkswagen and drove it while attending Cornell for graduate school. I then sold the Volkswagen and bought Mom's red Volkswagen Variant Sedan that she had imported from Europe. We took it on a three week trip across the country and shipped it to Hawaii where I would teach for the next three years. While there we bought a Volkswagen Camper and had fun camping all over Oahu. After three years, we shipped both vehicles back to the mainland and settled in Tucson for more graduate school work. The Variant got traded for a white Dotsun, and the camper was traded for a Mustang Convertible (my favorite car of all). With three boys we needed larger transportation, and the next car was a nine-passenger Mercury Station wagon which overheated frequently, but each boy got his own row of seats, and the fighting diminished. That then was traded for a large Chrysler Imperial, which could really move on the highway.

The car saga continued through another Chrysler after Jerry's friend wrecked the Imperial and then to a Mitsubishi then to a Mazda truck. A second Imperial ("The Bomb") was bought but proved to backfire, leave pits in the driveway, and stall, so it was sold for a Dodge Dynasty, which was then traded for a succession of three GMC Suburbans and two Trailblazers. We still have the second Trailblazer and like it very much.

I like cars to work when needed and do not like to try to fix them. I do like to trade for a newer car frequently, as you can see by the above succession of cars. Even today as we drive about, I think about how much we might like this one or that one. Some boys never really grow up when it comes to cars. When Maurice and I were young, we would pour over the car ads in Post Magazine and cut the new ones out each fall, and dream of the day when we could own a car. I happily can revert to those days in my mind and still admire the tear-shaped Chevrolet's. Maybe one of these days I can trade............