the back window on my car has been rattling & it is driving me nuts. i mensotioned it to the service guys the last time i took it in to the dealer & after they looked at it, they said it would be $600 to fix it! really? he suggested i turn the radio up, which i thought was pretty dismissive & patronizing. i certainly wasn't going to pay 600. to fix the window. so it still rattles. i'll take it to my neighborhood mechanic & see what he charges. it did remind me of something my father always used to tell us-
never get electric windows- they'll always break. now, i'll grant you that this particular piece of wisdom came in the 70's. still... & it got me thinking about my philosophy of cars & relationship with cars. and things my father always said about cars.
besides never getting electric windows, my father also recommended that one never got clocks in cars, as they also always broke. he would instead go up to the neighborhood dart drug (does anyone remember those?- they were scattered across northern virginia, having been founded by a funny looking man also responsible for crown books, one of the first discount booksellers- but i digress) & purchase a small, digital stick-on clock that went on the dashboard & did the job. they were easy to replace if they should break. they were also incredibly hard to read, especially at night.
so, no electric windows & no clocks in cars- they just break. while we did buy cars new, as you can imagine, they were pretty lacking in options. air conditioning, am/fm radio- that was pretty much it. & we kept our cars for a long time. this is a habit that has persisted for all of us hughes children. it is very rare for any of us to give up a car with less than 100, 000 miles on it. growing up, my dad did manage to stumble into some pretty fun cars. for a while we had a VW bug with a sunroof- the kind that you had to crank open. & in our adolescent years (my brother, sister & i were born within 4 1/2 years of each other), he had a firebird (unfortunately it did not perform particularly well). that firebird had an 8 track deck in it- we were pretty groovy. i remember we had the 8-track of workingman's dead. my brother blew out the speakers, so that bit of hipness was short lived. the firebird was pretty dinged & banged up by the time we were done with it. my father didn't get the dings & dents repaired- he said it helped in washington- people tended to stay out of your way with your car looking like that. the firebird was replaced by a car that came to be a family legend known as big blue- the ford ltd. this was sweet piece of machinery. & it was big!
this is exactly what big blue looked like, right down to the vinyl roof. you should have seen my mother driving it- she is about 5'1 or 5'2"- her head barely made it over the steering wheel. there was literally about 6-10" of air where the engine ended & the front of the car began. we felt as though the car arrived about 30 minutes before the rest of us did. & it was only a mid-sized car. ford only made these cars for 3 years- they were plagued by low sales- go figure! this was during the time that my dad had learned about buying cars from hertz & avis b/c they were good deals. & you know they were treated well b/c people always treat rental cars well,right? & like they were their own. big blue had the turning radius of .... i don't know-let's just say that one time i made a u-turn with big blue across 5 lanes & didn't have to back up & the entire family was impressed! i will say big blue could move- she had a V8 & was ready to rock & roll on the highway. one time in williamsburg iwth my brother we drove big blue to the grocery store- it was dark & at night. we later realized we drove big blue across a field- there was no road there. she handled it like a pro. we all had a fondness for big blue & were sorry to see her go.
the only other car that had the status of a legend in my family was the galaxie. this car achieved it's mythical status by being totaled 3 or 4 times.
it was stolen twice (& obviously returned to us- i know one time it was found in southeast washington, stripped of its tires), it was in multiple accidents, had it's driver side door ripped off one time & kept on ticking. my sister & i shared this car when she came to va. tech. by the end she had multiple colors- the car was dark green, the hood white, the driver side door was another color. we would get the check from GEICO for the total value of the car & get it fixed with used parts. she also had some power under her hood. it was finally sold to elmer, who happily drove her off to her new home in pulaski. she was a good car who served us well.
one of the sweetest things that my parents did for us (after paying for our college educations in full- which was really great) was buy each of us a car for a graduation present. a used car, of course. it equipped each of us to begin our adult lives with a car & a degree & no debt. you don't get much better of a start to adulthood & self-sufficiency than that. i ended up with a ford pinto- it was stick shift- which i didn't know how to drive, by the way, but i figured what better way to learn than baptism by fire. & it worked. i'd had that car about a year or two when it was stolen from in front of my house in radford, va (about a block from the tennis courts at radford university), used to hold up a wilco gas station & then taken to a field & set on fire. i was heartbroken because in order to replace it, i had to take on a car loan. i ended up replacing it with a datsun B210, which was a great car. & somewhere along the line- i don't know why- unlike all the rest of my family- i began to like cars & care a little bit about them. i think it was when i got my honda CRX that i started to care a bit more about what i drove. i had decided i liked sportier cars.
i purchased a 1991 CRXsi- this was the last year they made them. it did not have power windows (that option wasn't available for this car). i always felt i had to give people a diagram on how to work the windows- electric windows were pretty much the rule by then- or power locks. it was a pretty zippy little ride & fun to drive. it was a 2-seater- a hassle at times & a blessing at times. i still miss my CRX. i sold it in 2005 to a firemen who commuted to northern va from fredericksburg (that puppy got 38-40mpg on the highway). it had 140k on it, which was pretty good for a 4 cyclinder. & now, circling back to the point, until my mini window started acting up, the only car i ever had a problem with windows was the CRX & they were manual windows! i had to have the driver side window fixed several times- it kept getting stuck. i thought i'd bested my dad on a technicality until the stupid mini window issue came along- d'oh! dad wins again! i guess he always will b/c dad does know best!
ps. after mom & dad got rid of big blue, they made the move to honda. since that time, they have owned three hondas, all with electric windows & clocks, so you see- you can teach an old dog new tricks. my dad did demonstrate that cars are not something that he committed a great deal of his financial resources to & that value was instilled. while i probably actually enjoy cars more than my siblings, i'm not willing to invest but so many financial resources to a car. in my family, they are viewed primarily as a source of reliable transportation. i deviate from that a bit- but only so much. i do like my cars to be fun to drive! & sadie does look so good in that little red mini!
