Have you ever gotten together with friends and laughed about the days when gas was under a dollar. I was in high school then. It was the winter of 1996 when I got my driver’s license. To enable us to remain kids and not have the burden or auto ownership my parents, thankfully, provided my brother, sister and me with a car to share. We called it the “kid car.” More correctly I should say them. The “kid car” was actually a string of very old vehicles that spent the final months of their lives in our family. The parade went something like this.
1981 Caprice Classic Wagon
1972 Saab
This one was our favorite. The ignition had broken so my dad rigged the car to start by pressing a button. C’mon that’s cool!
1985 Honda Accord
BORING!
1976 Nova
Probably the most amazing of the bunch. This vehicle had no working speedometer. I would just guess at my speed. About 5% of the times that I made a left hand turn the passenger door would come unlatched and go flying open. The passenger door on a 1976 2-door Nova is no small object. Passengers were always required to buckle up.
1979 Toronado
This car was the one that I drove the most. I was pretty spectacular. When I went to college some random strangers stopped my our house and offered to buy it. It sold for less that I had paid for my roller blades.
The “Toro” was ’70s-gold and decked out. It had powerseats, leather, a little voice that told you when your 2-ton door was ajar, and to top it off, a V8 engine. Other features included rhythmic forceful shaking when stopped at a stoplight, a cloud of blue smoke as a declaration of superiority for whomever was behind me, and an amazing 6 miles per gallon. Here’s an image that I found online of the same year and color. If the phrase “pimp daddy” comes to mind then you’ve got the picture.
1981 Cadillac (DeVille I think)
123 inch wheel base. ‘nuf said.
When I married Jared in 1999 he had a 1995 Dodge Stratus. When I got married, in college, I didn’t even own a car. The Straus is still with us as our main vehicle. Yup, I still drive the first car that I ever owned. 2 years into our marriage we decided that a second vehicle was in order. Sticking with my family tradition of old second vehicles Jared and I purchased a 1986 Mazda pickup with awesome racing striped. This car looks like it should be wearing tight stonewash jeans, a hypercolor t-shirt while smoking a cigarette.
Back to gas prices. Our Stratus gets about 23 miles per gallon. At $3.49 a gallon driving is still cheaper than it was for me in 1996 when I paid just less than a dollar to drive 6 miles in that 1979 V8 Toronado.
Jed, Johanna, are my facts right?
