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AUTO-biography: My Life with Cars Timothy L. Hockett, 2018

AUTO-biography: My Life with Cars By Timothy L. Hockett

Cotacachi, Ecuador, 2018

The following is an account of the cars I owned, mixed with tidbits of my life associated with those

cars. It is not meant to be exhaustive nor a proper autobiography, but simply a collection of memories

– mostly fond memories. I hope family and friends enjoy these stories. I will admit from the onset

that my memory of some of the details is sketchy. Most of the photos were retrieved off the internet

but accurately reflect the year, make, model and color of the cars.

1. 1959 Ford Convertible

It wasn’t long after I got my driver’s license in 1966 that I bought my first car. It was a powder blue

1959 Ford. I still remember my Dad riding along with me to test drive the car. It was pretty, a

convertible and became the very definition of “cool” to me. I had found the listing for the car in the

local newspaper. The Ford was just like my Dad’s only his was a station wagon. The owner of the car

brought it to our house on Fulton Street in Sunnyvale, California. He offered to sit in the back seat

while Dad sat in the passenger seat as I drove it around the block. When we got back to the house, I

looked at my Dad with that yearning look. He simply said, “Well, pay the man.”

I had been working after school cleaning a machine shop in Mountain View and had dutifully peddled

my JC Higgins Ten-Speed bike back and forth 5 miles each way to earn $1.25 per hour. Even though I

only worked 2 hours a day, I somehow managed to amass the car’s purchase price of $125. I paid the

man cash and suppressed a gulp. It was by far the biggest transaction I had experienced in my vast

sixteen years of longevity. I remember the owner signed the pink slip and handed it to me. He wrote

on the Bill of Sale that he was gifting me the car. Answering my puzzled look, he said, “that way you

won’t have to pay sales tax.” At this impressionable age, I was already learning to cheat the

government.

I loved that car. Early in my ownership, my brother Terry helped me replace the front bench seat,

which had a large tear in it, with bucket seats from a Pontiac. Terry was a mechanic and he had

exchanged some work on a friend’s car for the bucket seats. Though they were the latest fad, he had

no use for them, so he installed them in my car. Those seats made that car even cooler.

Terry came in handy when I needed to do work on

that car (and a few others). I was relatively useless

as a mechanic, but he was always willing to advise

or lend a hand. I distinctly remember changing a

head gasket. Of course, I had no clue what I was

doing, but eagerly got my hands dirty. Terry gave

me specific instructions but did not oversee my

work. I remember torqueing down the head and

trying to start the car with the new gasket

installed. Something was terribly wrong. Terry

had told me exactly what to do, and I thought I had

followed his coaching carefully. When the engine wouldn’t run, I asked him to take a look. He looked

at it and with a big smirk said, “You know, Timmy, it would run perfectly if you hadn’t torqued the

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head down right over this wire.” He pointed to a red wire providing power to the heater; it was firmly

torqued between the head and the engine block, not allowing the head to provide compression. This

smashed the wire flat, but also ruined the head gasket. Terry laughed and helped me fix it. It would

not be the first of my repairs that my brother would have to correct.

This reminds me of so many things about growing up with a brother eight years my senior who was a

dyed-in-the-wool gear head. I still remember the permanent smell of gasoline on him and his entire

life spent with the ubiquitous black gunk under his fingernails. Mom got after him once when she

discovered in our bedroom, on the floor near the head of my bed, a three pound coffee can containing

a carburetor soaking in gasoline. I had been breathing that in for a few nights. This is likely why my

math skills were never very good.

The car’s 352 ci Thunderbird Interceptor V8 was very powerful. In fact, the sedan version of that

model was used as a police interceptor back in the day. I was immature and a show off. This was not

a good combination. One of my first purchases for the car was a pair of rear tires. They were called

“cheater slicks” because they had flat surfaces except for just two deep grooves of tread, making them

legal tires – but barely legal. With the car’s new shoes, I commenced to burning rubber regularly for

no reasons at all other than I could do it and I was stupid. When I had to buy new rear tires after only

six months, my Dad smiled and said, “Maybe now you’ll stop burning rubber all the time.” I found out

soon enough that needlessly spinning those tires would not only present me with the need for

frequent tire purchases, but with traffic tickets. I got two in rather quick succession and was promptly

removed from my Dad’s insurance policy.

That Ford holds lots of memories for me. I bought a surfboard and would put it nose first under the

back of the passenger seat. It would stick out the back and announce to the world that I was a cool

surfer dude. Many are the times that I drove over Highway 17 to Santa Cruz from home in Sunnyvale

to try my luck. I wasn’t very good at surfing, but enjoyed the beach and the exhaustion that ensued

from spending the day trying to catch waves.

The independence that came with my first set of wheels was both exhilarating and a test of my

maturity. It was so great to finally be able to drive to high school rather than ride the bus. I felt so

grown up. But it was not so great to be caught by a policeman as my girlfriend and I on a dark, lonely

road decided to try out the other use for the back seat.

I hadn’t owned my Ford for two years when my best friend, Dave Hanson, purchased a thoroughly

British sports car – a Triumph Spitfire. We had so much fun tinkering with that car and driving it to its

limits on the curvy mountain road called Highway 9. This experience soon convinced me that my life

would be so much better if I owned a real sports car. I would soon have one.

2. 1964 Austin Healey Sprite

In 1968 four significant things happened in quick succession that would teach me a lot about cars and

about life. I wrecked two cars and bought two cars.

I was in the final months of high school, driving Dad’s ’59 Ford Station Wagon, when I was broadsided

by a driver who blew through a stop sign. Dad’s car was totaled. The police arrested the other driver;

an older fellow whom they suspected was drinking. They said I was lucky to be alive and I was not

charged.

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I remember going with Dad a couple of days later as he purchased a replacement for his Ford at a used

car lot; he bought a black, 1964 Mercury Comet.

Not long thereafter it was time for me to begin college. I attended the opening year of De Anza College

in nearby Cupertino. This was just a couple years before Steve Jobs would develop Apple Computer

in his now famous Cupertino home garage. I had already been nagging my Dad for a sports car. He

was always kind but also conservative and cautioned me over and over that a sports car had no

practical value. At last, he caved in and took me to the dealership where he’d bought his Mercury.

When we left the house that day, I didn’t really know what kind of sports car I wanted; all I knew was

that I just really, really wanted one. The salesman who sold Dad his car tried to talk me out of it. “No,

no, son … you don’t want a sports car. You want a solid American car like your Dad. I’ve got another

Mercury.” But I was insistent. The salesman actually had to do some swapping with a neighboring

dealership to get me the cool car I had seen on their lot down the street – a 1964 Austin Healey Sprite.

I traded in my Ford and I think added $600 to complete the purchase.

It was a tiny car in every way. At just over 11 feet

long, it was two feet shorter than a VW Beetle. It

was only 4’ 7” wide. With its tight turning circle,

you could easily do a 360 on any neighborhood

street. Of course its tiny top was lowered

manually. And it sported a concomitant tiny

engine, providing a whopping 59 horsepower. It

was just what I wanted, a genuine British-built

sports car. That night I turned off the engine and

just sat quietly in the driveway at home admiring

my new purchase. I didn’t care that it was tiny; my

love was blind.

Alas, my love was short-lived. The next day I drove to work to my first restaurant job, The Capn’s

Galley pizza parlor. It was a slow day so the boss said I could take off early. I could not resist the

temptation to drive my new-found love up into the mountains on Highway 9. That late afternoon I

crashed my car into a VW bus. There were no injuries, but the front of my car was torn from the rest

of it like a peeled banana. It was a call home that I will never forget.

Dad picked up the phone.

“Hello.”

“Um … Dad? … is Mom there?”

“Your mother’s busy son, what do you need?”

“Um … Dad I wrecked my car.”

“Are you okay?”

“Yessir, no injuries, but my car is totaled.”

“Where are you son?”

“I’m up at a junk yard where my car has been hauled … it’s up on Highway 9.”

“What in the hell?” his voice trailed off. And then he said,” I’ll be up there as soon as I can.”

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My Dad and I rode quietly home. To my surprise there was no ass chewing, no parental inquisition.

About twenty minutes into the drive home I broke the silence. “I am so sorry, Dad.” “I know son.”

We didn’t speak of it again until the next day when we explained to that same car salesman – the one

who had given me the warning – that I would now be very happy to have a practical car. Dad fronted

me the money and I bought a 1964 Mercury Comet, just like his.

3. 1964 Mercury Comet

Well, my 1964 Mercury Comet wasn’t exactly like my

Dad’s. His was black, mine was white. His had a six

cylinder engine, mine had a V8. His was the base

model, mine was the Comet Caliente! It turned out

that Dad was right. That Mercury was one of the

most reliable cars I ever owned.

The car had plenty of power and one luxury item that

our family had never experienced – an air

conditioner. The San Francisco Bay Area has a very

moderate climate, but I thought that air conditioner was the schnizzel.

Having grown up in

Lancaster, California

in the middle of the

Mojave Desert, I knew

what hot cars were

like. All my young life

I remember getting

into our cars with the

heat literally boiling

out and then having to sit on those thick clear plastic seat covers that were so hot they’d burn your

legs. In one of our earlier cars we had a swamp cooler air conditioner that allowed air to pass through

a wet filter and then into the car. It was installed by simply rolling it tight into the car window. It

certainly was novel, and did provide some relief, but my Mercury had real, Freon-charged air

conditioning mounted under the dash.

It was this car that I owned when I got married at the ripe old age of 19. The wedding was actually in

the month that I turned 19. It was a small, humble ceremony, done on a shoestring. Terry was my

best man. I asked him for only one favor, to get that grease off of his hands. I still remember (forty-

eight years later) him handing me Lori’s wedding ring to place on her finger as I said my vows. His

fingers were ringed with that permanent grime. At the time, I

was not amused, but we laughed about it for years thereafter.

Marrying Lori helped me very quickly to come to grips with my

irresponsible behavior in cars. As a new husband it became

apparent to me that now I had obligations and responsibilities

that required maturity in place of sophomoric recklessness. I also

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realized that my tickets combined with my accidents were costing me plenty. When I was excluded

from Dad’s insurance policy, I had to literally go across town, across the tracks to this insurance man

who had a seedy office in a strip mall. My car coverage was to cost me something like $400 a year.

That was a huge amount of money for me as I was not yet even making $3 per hour.

Despite settling down and not having tickets or other accidents for years afterwards, I was by no

means mature. For no reason at all, we newlyweds decided we should own a brand new car. After

all, our combined income was now over $600 per month.

4. 1970 AMC Gremlin

Having owned the Mercury for about two years, and having tied the knot in 1969, we as a couple faced

the future with nothing but optimism and excitement. As we started our lives together, what better

way to celebrate than to buy a new car? I suppose I had made stupider decisions, but this was a doozy.

Lori and I went into an American Motors dealership,

neither of us having experience buying a new car. We

looked at some brochures, selected exactly what we

wanted, and ordered from the factory a brand new

1970 AMC Gremlin. Dad had always cautioned me

about buying the first run of a first-year model, the

ones, he said, that they had not yet “worked the bugs

out of,” but we took the plunge. As an insult to the

automotive and art world, we ordered the car in bright

lime green. [A favor I ask of you, dear reader, — next time I say I want to order a lime green car, do

me a favor and punch me in the mouth!]

We were so excited when we got the call that our brand new Gremlin had arrived. It was so cool. It

had a new feature called a “hatch back.” It sported a spunky six-cylinder engine and a 3-speed stick

shift. We loved that car … for almost a week.

Upon delivery, the dealer told us that they knew we were excited to get it but admitted that they had

not yet gone over the car with a quality review. So they allowed us to take the car that day, with the

understanding that if we found anything that the factory had “missed” to just jot it down, bring the

car back in, and they’d make any adjustments we needed. We were thrilled.

A few days later we returned the car with a list of 17 things that needed adjustment – screws that

needed to be tightened, panels that needed to be fitted better, all kinds of things. My recollection is

that the car actually ran pretty well the entire time we had it, but its fit and finish were just sub-

standard.

One little recollection of the Gremlin still irks me. I had ordered the extra-

special Gremlin gas cap. I think we had to pay $15 extra for the add-on. We

went to the pizza parlor to show off our new car to my fellow employees. It

was our first or second day of ownership. When we brought out the crew to

see the car, someone said, “Hey, where’s the gas cap?” Someone had stolen

it. I stuffed the hole with a red rag, drove to an auto parts store and bought

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a plain, ugly locking gas cap. I am not a spiteful person, but I continue to wish a pox on the thief and

his family.

Eventually we would need to add a second car. That’s when I found the finest car I ever owned.

5. 1956 Jaguar XK-140MC Roadster

Far and away the best car I ever owned was a 1956 Jaguar XK-140MC Roadster. Every memory of this

automobile causes me to fight back tears. If only I had kept her. I honestly cannot even find a junked,

pre-restoration example now for under $80,000. Had I retained my Jag, I honestly think it would now

be worth north of $100,000.

I was still working at the Milpitas Round Table Pizza parlor in 1969 (you will recall the year when Neal

Armstrong set foot on the moon) when I put out the word in my small circle of friends that I’d like to

find a classic sports car to restore. The Gremlin was getting us to and from our jobs, but we needed

more wheels and I wanted a project. Within a few weeks I was told of an old Jag for sale, sitting in

someone’s back yard with a tarp over it. It sounded interesting.

I went to find the car and upon inspection discovered that the top was completely shot; the steering

barely worked and the breaks didn’t work at all. The interior looked like it had been used as a dog

house for a large, furry canine that had nothing better to do than chew up the seats. There were a

few dents in the fenders and small dings in the aluminum doors and trunk lid as well. This would truly

be a project. When I tried the ignition, the owner and I were both surprised when it started. The raw

potential of this car, combined with its beautiful lines and bright red paint, convinced me to fork over

the full asking price of $500.

Dave Hanson, my best friend, helped me nurse the car two or three miles via back roads to my place.

I remember having to turn the steering wheel two full turns each way to get the car to gradually

change lanes. We had tried the hand (emergency) brake and convinced ourselves that if we didn’t go

much over ten miles per hour, we could get this car home. I can’t ever remember being so terrified

and energized at the same time.

In the course of just a very few days, Dave and I fixed the steering and the brakes. We jury rigged the

rack and pinion steering and put in a new master cylinder and adjusted the brakes so it would stop on

a dime. It was now capable of getting from point A to point B without fear of some deadly mishap,

which my parents and wife were fairly certain was now a likely possibility. They were all too aware of

my history.

But I was just getting started. The car would go, but it was extremely uncomfortable. It needed a new

interior.

Back in the 60’s there was a great car parts catalog, called JC Whitney. It was roughly the size of a

phone book and contained listing of all kinds of car paraphernalia to suit just about any car enthusiast’s

tastes. Because I was a kid and had virtually no budget to restore this car, I turned to JC Whitney. I

ordered new upholstery, carpeting and a new top. What tedium it was to rip out and replace the

interior. I had no special tools. But I did it. Using the existing frame for the convertible roof which

incorporated a wood cross bar, I nailed the new top material to the frame with a gzillion tiny tacks. It

was so tight that I had to heat the material to get it to fully stretch. But when I was done it operated

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perfectly and, when down, hid completely behind the seats. The new seats got new padding and while

stripped, I made sure the seat mechanisms would adjust perfectly. The carpeting was a simple

undertaking and the crowning glory was a full tonneau cover that could be fitted to cover the cockpit

when the top was down. The car did not have roll down windows, but rather side curtains with plastic,

side-sliding windows. Fitted to the doors, they could be used whether the top was up or not, but

usually were kept in the trunk as I almost always drove it in convertible mode.

The Jag had a number of features that

reflected classic sports cars from the 50’s

and before. 16” wire wheels were held on

spindles with “knock off” spinners. A brass

hammer was included in the tool kit for

those times when you needed to change a

tire. A special jack was engineered so that

you could jack up the car while remaining

seated in the driver’s seat. The engine

didn’t start with the twist of a key, but with

a starter button in the dash. And the

coolest of all was an instrument panel with a tachometer and speedometer facing the driver in that

order. The tach was more prominent than the speedometer. Finally, it had two-speed electric

windshield wipers instead of vacuum assist wipers … unheard of in 1956.

As I mentioned above, the car ran ok when I got it,

but I would not be satisfied until the engine would

be rebuilt. For this job I turned to my dear

brother, Terry. He drooled when he first saw the

dual overhead cam engine. The polished

aluminum cam covers made the engine look like a

piece of fine art. I remember his delight as he

noted that whereas the exhaust manifolds on

American cars were perpetually rusty, the Jag’s

exhaust was coated in baked enamel … it was

black and shiny. But the motor was literally shoehorned into the engine compartment and presented

quite a challenge for tune ups. As Terry puzzled over how to adjust the carburetors, he discovered

that if he removed the front passenger side tire, he could access pre-stamped holes through the wheel

well through which he could adjust the carbs with a screwdriver. The engineering of the car, right

down to the tiniest detail, was simply phenomenal. Terry spent several weeks of his spare time

rebuilding that engine. I remember it cost more than $600 in parts. Terry did the work for free.

When Terry finished, we decided to test the car’s metal. It was loud, needing new mufflers, but WOW

did it go. It had a four-speed manual on the floor sans synchromesh. That rebuilt and finely tuned

engine would take it to 90 mph in second gear. A plaque on the dash reminded me I owned a super

car. It said “CERTIFIED that this Jaguar car is a replica of the record-breaking car which achieved the

speed of 141.51 MPH at Jabbeke, Belgium” and signed by Jaguar’s chief engineer. Holy cow, I owned

a car that would do 141.51 MPH back in 1956! It’s long wheelbase held the benefit of making you feel

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like you were going more slowly than you were. Many were the times when I had to back off on the

gas as the car had “drifted” up to near 100 on the freeway.

Many cars were quicker, very few were faster. I

remember a neighbor in Portland, Oregon , Marv

Davis, who had a TR6. We would wash and wax our

cars together and enjoy car talk. One day he

challenged me to a dual out on the freeway. As we

decided to go all out from about a 50 MPH rolling

start, he led me at every shift of the gears, but then

his top speed of 120 MPH was reached. He could do

nothing as I pulled away. Later I told him, “See Marv,

140 is faster than 120.” Yes, we were stupid. No, we

didn’t get caught.

This car, however, as fantastic as it was, required tinkering, lots and lots of tinkering. I think I had the

hood open at least every couple of weeks. The side-draft carburetors needed to be synchronized from

time to time to keep fuel and air flowing at the same rate to all cylinders. Within a year I had all the

specialized tools I needed to keep the Jag well-tuned, well-loved.

I never finished the body work but did add a pair of driving lights on the front bumper. They were so

bright that a nice CHP officer pulled me over and advised me to put checkered covers over them. He

said they were so bright that they were actually illegal in Oregon. I used to falsely boast that the lights

would melt snow at 30 feet and that I was frequently asked to bring my car to provide light for local

night football games!

If having that car during the first couple of years of college were not impressive enough, I added one

last flair. I bought a WWI leather flight helmet with dark goggles and a red scarf. I would often don

these items, especially on long trips from the SF Bay Area to Portland, Oregon so that I looked like

Snoopy (ala the Red Baron) driving that red Jag. People would wave and honk and carry on as my red

scarf flapped in the breeze. I would wave back, showing off my British racing gloves.

Alas, during some dip in my student budget, Lori and I decided we needed to sell the car for college

money. I sold it to an attorney for $1,800, more than three times what I paid for it. That transaction

was my loss and his gain. The memories are priceless.

See this tear in the corner of my eye?

6. 1970 Honda Trail 70

By the time I sold the Jaguar, I was a couple of years into my studies at Columbia Christian College in

Portland. We moved off campus and lived in an apartment about three-quarters of a mile away. It

was walkable, but uphill all the way. I got the ingenious idea of buying a small motorcycle to commute.

A fellow student, Dennis Evans, told me his Dad had a small motor cycle for sale. He was using it to

get around his big potato farm in Idaho. I bought it sight unseen and soon it was delivered to Portland

when his parents came to visit the school.

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There were lots of cool things about my

Honda Trail 70. It was small, had a push

button electric starter, auto clutch and was

very thrifty. While it would reach a top speed

of only 38 MPH, it was completely street legal.

I bought a gold helmet to match the gold paint

and used the bike to get around all over town.

I still remember that I could fill the little half-

gallon gas tank for $.25 and ride all week.

To my recollection I never had an incident on

that motorcycle, despite my Dad’s wise

counsel, “Son, remember, on a motorcycle

you don’t get a second chance after a bad accident.”

My memory fails me as to what became of the Honda. It sure was fun.

7. 1947 Dodge sedan

After the Jaguar sold sometime close to 1972, my regret fueled a renewed yearning for another classic.

My recollection is that I saw a car lot somewhere in NE Portland that had automobiles available strictly

on consignment. It was a strange situation, because the person on the lot was not authorized to sell

the cars, but simply to take offers and pass them on to the owners. What made me stop was a ’57

Chevy Bel Air coupe. The car was amazing. It had a new deep metallic forest green paint job, a newly

rebuilt 327 V8, new black brocade upholstery and a spring loaded 3-speed shifter on the floor. It was

gorgeous and didn’t need restoring. The lot attendant said the owner wanted $900 for it. I said I

needed to chat with my wife and that I would be back. I chatted with the wife and she said “Let’s get

it.” Alas, that afternoon when we returned with the $900, the Chevy was not on the lot. “You just

missed it,” the lot attendant told us. I was so disappointed.

But there was another car that

caught my eye; it was a ’47

Dodge sedan.

Lori and I took it for a test drive

and immediately fell in love with

it. Although it smelled like an old

man’s study, and had scratchy

mohair upholstery, the interior

actually looked new. Its 25 years

had been kind. When I told the

attendant that I had restored a

Jaguar, he said, “this would be a

piece of cake to restore, because

the hardest part to restore is the

interior and it’s almost perfect.”

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We opened the suicide

doors (those are doors

where the handles meet in

the middle of the car

because the back doors are

hinged at the back) and

marveled at the cavernous

interior. One could sit in

the back seat with legs

outstretched and not touch

the front seat. It had little

lights for the back seat

passengers just above their shoulders on the window sides. There too were hand straps so one could

hang on for dear life if necessary.

The beauty of the car from

the driver’s seat was equally

impressive. There was a lot

of chrome, many knobs and

dials and, of course, the

coveted starter button.

Everything worked, even the

clock. One fun memory was

that we had to wait for the

tubes to warm up before the

radio would play. It took a

few seconds, but was quite

the novelty to us. All of that

chrome was set against what

appeared to be a beautifully

carved wood dashboard. I

soon learned that it was simply painted to appear like wood. The steering wheel was big and the

three-speed shifter was on the column.

On the test drive, I noticed what I thought was the clutch slipping pretty badly. In fact, I noticed that

I could completely take my foot off the clutch and instead of lurching, the car would just slowly begin

to move. I asked the attendant what was wrong. He said, “there’s nothing wrong, that’s the hydra-

power drive.” He went on to explain that there was a fluid coupling between the engine and

transmission filled with transmission fluid. The coupler held two impellers facing each other. I looked

puzzled. He continued, “you know how you can take two fans and face them toward each other, plug

in one and turn it on and soon the other fan turns?” I nodded. “Well, if you encase that in heavy oil,

it creates a stronger force, and in this instance it creates a very smooth take off.” It was Dodge’s pre-

cursor to an automatic transmission.

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Lori and I looked at each other and we gave the man the nod. But this time we had the cash. He called

the owner and the deal was done, then and there. I bought it for the $900 I had in my pocket.

I owned the Dodge for about three years, taking it on several trips along the west coast from Portland

to the SF Bay Area. By then it was already a head turner, a seeming relic from just after WWII.

As I saved money to invest in the car, I identified an engine remanufacturing shop that specialized in

classic and antique restoration. For the very first time, I spared my brother Terry the task of rebuilding

an old engine. They did a spectacular job. They blueprinted the engine, meaning that they rebuilt it

to exact factory specifications. I loved it. It was so well balanced and so finely tuned that it would idle

at only 200 RPM. You could actually see the fan blade turn, it was so slow. But the tightness of the

engine caused another problem. It didn’t like to turn over and start with its weak 6 volt system. So

the only thing I did to the Dodge that was not original, and with plenty of advice from enthusiasts and

collectors, was to convert it to a 12 volt system. From then on, the car was a dream. Like the Jag, the

long wheel base made it glide. I got the car a fresh coat of midnight black paint and loved owning it

right up until the crash.

After I graduated from college, I stayed on at that institution and served as a teaching assistant. This

was the academic year of 1975-1976. Lori and I had made a trip to Israel and decided that we would

move there to pursue graduate school at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

The day before we were to get onto the plane

in July of 1976, a fellow did not see me

stopped at an intersection and plowed into

the back of the Dodge. It was more than a

disaster. While the car was not beyond

repair, finding a trunk lid for a ’47 Dodge

would take a national search. I had to leave

the car in the care of a dear friend. We had

already liquidated our stuff and he had

agreed to sell it for us anyway. It took several

months to finally get it repaired and a few

years to finally sell the car.

8. 1974 Fiat 128 sedan

We arrived in Israel late in the first week of July, 1976. The airport was abuzz when we landed at Lod,

as the Israel Defense Force had just successfully freed 98 Israeli hostages being held in Entebbe,

Uganda by terrorists in support of Idi Amin. From that day forward for the next four years I would get

not only a great education from the Hebrew University, but an up-close and personal view of life in a

country surrounded by hostile neighbor nations. Many friends no-doubt thought I was an idiot for

taking a wife and two small children to this war-torn country, but, if one wanted to study the Jewish

roots of Christianity and anything associated with Biblical studies, there was no better place to go.

In four short years I would study four languages (Greek, Hebrew, Aramaic and German); historical

geography of the ancient Near East; the historical, cultural and linguistic development of ancient near

eastern religions; and, of course the Hebrew Bible (known by Christians as the Old Testament). Believe

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it or not, I was also able to study the New Testament taught by Jewish professors of world renown.

Throw in deep study of apocryphal and pseudepigraphic literature, the Septuagint and early Gnostic

literature with a solid introduction to the Talmud, peppered with a study of the development of Jewish

and Rabbinic Literature as well as the literary milieu from which the Bible emerged and you will

understand how busy I was. It was an awesome experience, even though there were days when I

thought my head would explode.

It wasn’t long before the practical side of life jerked me back from my disbelief that I was actually at

the heart of Judaism and Christianity. We needed housing and we needed transportation.

For more than a year we rented a

nice, furnished apartment in a

fashionable neighborhood of

Jerusalem on Haportzim street. It

was close in to downtown and

convenient for almost everything.

We lived right around the corner

from the President’s House. Later

we rented a place in East Talpiot

on Ole Hagardom street. The

apartment in East Talpiot was

further out, but was a spectacular

top-floor apartment with fantastic

views. It was out far enough,

however, that we would need a car.

During that first year, we made use of our feet and the bus system to get around. It seemed easy at

the time. We could walk almost anywhere. But when we wanted to travel much more than a mile,

we used the bus. At the time, it cost 10 cents and we could even transfer busses and go fairly long

distances on that dime. I traveled to the Mount Scopus campus of the Hebrew University and later to

the Givat Ram campus by bus just about every day. But once we faced moving to the outskirts of

Jerusalem, we worked to save for a car.

Cars and fuel in Israel are extremely expensive. Car prices were roughly double the prices in the States.

Israel buys its gasoline from Arab states, so guess what the price was like? I remember paying

something like 2 dollars per liter, way back in 1977!

There was a mechanism whereby foreigners could buy automobiles and transfer automobiles to other

foreigners to avoid paying the duty imposed by the State of Israel. This required considerable

bureaucracy, but was well worth the aggravation. The transactions were actually logged into (or out

of) your passport. It was called a “passport-to-passport” sale. The one caveat was that you were not

supposed to leave the country without those items written in your passport. Guess what? It was

impossible to enforce. It was one of those many examples of having a convoluted bureaucracy for

bureaucracy’s sake. I visited the States and made a trip to Greece without ever taking the car out.

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But by this means I found a

used Fiat 128 for sale by an

American. I bought the

canary yellow car for $3500.

It would become a handy

little runabout for our

family. It was an American

model which meant it had

better bumpers and

ostensibly better safety

equipment. I was surprised,

however, when I took it in

for its safety inspection and

was told they would have to change the headlights because the ones that came with the car were just

a little too bright. I still roll my eyes as I think about it.

The car was small, but had four doors. The trunk was tiny but it was adequately powered and thrifty

when it came to gas mileage. I would enjoy seeing almost every inch of Israel from the driver’s seat

of that Fiat, including the panoramic view of Jerusalem that I would take in every morning as I drove

into the university. It was both breathtaking and inspiring. I made many trips from Acco in the north

to the Gulf of Eilat in the south; from Tel Aviv and Jaffa on the coast, to Jericho and the River Jordan

on the east and most places in between. Once we even forded a flash flood near Masada in order to

get home.

Two stories about the car illustrate: first, the dual culture in Israel; and second, the reason why so

many back in that day felt that FIAT was actually an acronym for “Fix It Again Tony.”

One day outside the Baptist Church on Narkiss Street, someone backed into the car and caved in one

the back doors. I was a student and did not relish the cost of repair. At a local Israeli body shop the

cost was going to be at least a couple of hundred dollars. But, my friend Joe, said, “Let’s take it to an

Arab village I know where they specialize in auto repair.” I did and received the car back looking new.

It cost $60 and the work was done the old fashioned way with the dents being pounded out by

hammers. I was truly amazed at the fine work of the Palestinian craftsmen.

On another fateful day, I was sitting in the parking lot of the Hebrew University when I tried to start

the car and heard a loud snap. As I tried the starter again I heard a foreboding crinkle, smash, crunch

come from the engine. The engine wouldn’t start and I had to have it towed to a garage. After tearing

the top of the engine apart the mechanic was able to see that the timing belt (not timing chain) had

snapped. This allowed the starter to crank the pistons but did not allow the valves to move out of the

way. The result was that several valves broke and twisted themselves right into the tops of the pistons.

Using a belt for this critical function is what I have come to refer to as a “bad design.” Most modern

cars have designed the overhead cams and valves in such a way that the valves pull back away from

the pistons or the pistons actually have engineered clearance so that they cannot touch the valves if

a timing problem occurs. They also use a timing chain. The entire top of the engine had to be rebuilt

with a few pistons and all the valves replaced. The car only had 35,000 miles on it at the time. That

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was the last Fiat I owned. Now Fiat has merged with Chrysler. I know this begs for negative

conclusions, but the above experience was 42 years ago.

One of the last things I had to do before we left Israel in 1980 was to sell my car passport-to-passport

to the next unsuspecting owner. I remember it took several hours at the Israeli equivalent of the DMV

to transfer the car. The highest compliment that I was ever paid about my facility with the Hebrew

language was at the end of this lengthy transaction when the clerk, a nice lady sabra (or native born

Israeli) asked me. “Hey, you’re American right? Where did you learn to speak Hebrew so beautifully?”

I told her about my advanced studies at the Hebrew University. “She nodded and said, you speak

better than most Israelis.” I actually blushed when I said thank you.

9. 1981 Toyota Corolla

When our family returned to the States in the summer of 1980, I had a job awaiting me at Columbia

Christian College. I was to teach upper-division courses, including Greek and Hebrew languages. The

college took up a few square blocks in an otherwise sleepy neighborhood. Over its history, it had

purchased several homes that it used to house faculty members. We moved into one of the houses

on 92nd Place near Glisan Street.

Though virtually everything was within walking

distance, we soon purchased a brand new 1981

Toyota Corolla. I am not certain of the date of

purchase, but among the papers I kept in a box,

I found the original new car sticker. The sticker

price was $5710.

The four-door sedan was brown, had tan interior

and was solid as a rock. I loved the car. This was

the first Japanese car I had owned and the

second brand new car I had purchased. Wow.

The fit and the finish made me a believer. Whereas American cars in the seventies and eighties tended

toward “cheap” finish and rattle, the Toyota’s tight fit and that “chump” sound when you closed the

doors led me to believe that Japan might soon dominate the world market.

One memorable emergency with the Toyota brings back a fond memory. A year or so into our

ownership of the car, it just died. For the life of me, I could not figure out what was wrong. A dear

friend and mechanic, Bruce Perry, offered to take a look. [I should mention here that Bruce was also

a student of mine whom I found to be a genuine genius and not a little quirky. He had many meals at

our table and, like Terry, my brother, had ever-present car grime under his fingernails.] Bruce first

determined that the problem was electrical. After a few minutes, he also deduced that behind the

kick panel beside the driver’s left foot was a circuit board that he would need to take out to inspect.

I, of course, was of no help at all. I watched him carefully with my head leaning left then right like the

proverbial monkey looking at a math problem. Bruce quickly dislodged the circuit board and we

carried it carefully into the house where he placed it on the dining room table. The circuit board

contained a number of flat metal strips instead of wires. He flipped it over to look at the back and all

the strips fell out. He looked at me and said with a grin, “Ut oh, do you remember where all those

go?” I was horrified. There was now a nest of about twenty angular strips laying on the table like an

15


unsolvable puzzle. Seeing my obvious sense of loss, Bruce let me down easy and said reassuringly, “I

know how to put it back together.“ Being the genius that he was, he put them all back into the circuit

board in maybe a minute. It was during this process that he noticed that one strip was burned in half.

“Here’s our problem,” he said, “I bet this will be a recall item in the future.” He then replaced a section

of the wire with a cut strip from the shiny side of a gum wrapper and re-installed the panel in the car.

I was dumbfounded. Not only did it work, I never had a problem again. I still love Bruce.

The car was ever-after a delight to drive. I kept it into the early nineties and eventually put over

190,000 miles on it. It was this little car that I used when teaching four daughters how to drive. My

hand still has a tremor when I think about those particular adventures.

Years later, my second wife Patty would drive it over a pole that some kids pulled across a dark street

on a foggy night. The impact tore the front axle off the car. The Corolla was one of the most reliable

automobiles I ever owned … right up until its untimely demise.

10. 1967 Chevy Pickup

When the economy went into recession in the ‘80s, the college did not escape its impact. In 1982

several faculty members were laid off, me among them. In retrospect I can say it was the only job I

ever lost involuntarily. Upon hearing of my plight, a dear friend, Mike Sanders, minister at the time of

the Church of Christ in Olympia, WA, told me about an opening for a pulpit minister at the Church of

Christ in Aberdeen, WA. I had not planned a career preaching, but quickly interviewed for the position

and was offered the job. As with many ministerial positions, a house was provided as part of the

compensation package. It was a lovely place, spacious and set among beautiful hemlock trees. It was

virtually secluded a few hundred feet behind the church building.

I was told by the committee that hired me that whereas they had shouldered the utility costs of former

ministers, they had decided they could not do that moving forward. This news was a bit alarming to

us as the church was located in dreary Gray’s Harbor, known for lots of rain. The committee explained

to us that some ten miles away in Satsop, two large nuclear power plants were under construction,

but the Washington Public Power Supply System (WPPSS or Whoops!) was not viewed as financially

stable. The committee anticipated that WPPSS would not finish the power plants and would default.

That would result in everyone’s electricity bill going through the roof. As a consolation, the committee

had authorized the purchase and installation of a large wood stove, which, they felt, would more than

adequately heat the house.

It wasn’t long before I found myself building a woodshed on the side of the house and spending

considerable time on the business end of chain saws, splitting mauls and all the accoutrements of

living with wood heat. I also decided to buy a pickup.

Since I lived in a logging town that was surrounded by forestland, I found it was common for locals to

get annual firewood permits for $10 from Weyerhaeuser and to drive into designated areas to cut

firewood from the remains of logging operations. When I realized that by that means I could heat my

house for very little money, I took the plunge and bought a green 1967 Chevy pickup. It was low-

geared, had an extra set of springs in case you wanted to add a camper and, oh yes, leaked oil every

day I owned it. That said it was the perfect truck for getting firewood.

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Because I only paid a few hundred bucks for it, I chose

not to baby that Chevy. It had already had a rough

and tumble life and I decided to continue in that vein.

Many were the times that I overloaded the truck and

otherwise abused it.

Mind you, I had zero experience with cutting and

chopping wood before I moved to Aberdeen. The

following stories illustrate my naiveté.

After I agreed to the “wood heat” arrangement, it dawned on me that I did not have the equipment I

needed to manage wood, so I went to the local Cenex store to buy a chainsaw and other stuff

associated with heavy manual labor. After I selected a nice Husqvarna saw, and a large maul, I asked

the clerk where I could find leather gloves. He asked, “How many pair do you need?” I looked at him

in amazement. “Well, one,” I said. He smiled as he looked down at my black dress shoes. See, I had

never actually worn out a pair of gloves. I was an academic, a scholar, how could I possibly wear out

a pair of leather gloves? I soon found out.

A few weeks later, after a few trips to the woods, I decided I could speed up the whole process by

purchasing an entire log truck load of wood. For only $200 I purchased 55,000 pounds of twisted logs

good for nothing other than firewood. Most of the logs were about 3’ in diameter. The logs were

transported by one of the members of the church, Jug Krimble, who drove a log truck for a living. He

dumped the load on the property near our house. Imagine twenty-seven and a half tons of gigantic

logs. When cut and stacked it represented more than twelve cord of wood. That’s twenty-four full

pickup loads. I wore out the gloves, several pair of jeans, my arms, legs and back and swore that was

one of the stupidest projects I had ever undertaken. But the multi-month project taught me to

appreciate honest, physical labor.

I kept the truck for the four years that we lived in Aberdeen and used it almost exclusively for firewood

hauling and hunting.

Soon I was bitten again by the higher education bug. I applied to and was accepted into a joint PhD

program of the University of California, Berkeley and the Graduate Theological Union. In the Bay Area

our transportation needs would change significantly. My dad, once again, would help.

11. 1974 Cadillac Sedan de Ville

Having been away from academic pursuits for about four years, I had become anxious to pursue my

PhD. We left Aberdeen, WA and found a nice apartment in Alameda, CA only 11 miles from the UC

Berkeley campus. I still remember how nice it was to rediscover the salubrious climate of the San

Francisco Bay Area. I obtained a job in San Francisco that allowed me the latitude to study and we

settled into graduate school life once again. For a short time, Lori’s parents loaned us their brown

Ford Pinto. Later we would learn that the Ford Pinto was one of the ones that could explode into a

fatal conflagration if struck just right from the rear. Nevertheless, it supplemented our Toyota nicely.

The Pinto was a short-term fix and my Dad soon made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.

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When I say “Dad,” I am referring to my step-dad, Delbert E. McEwen, who married my mom when I

was about seven years old. He loved us as his own and garnered our respect for his kindness, fairness,

protection and genuine love. He was smart and funny. He was also big. Dad stood at about 6’7” and

probably weighed about 300 lbs. He wore a size 17 shoe. Mom, on the other hand, stood 5’ 2” and

maybe weighed 110 lbs. Because of his size, he always flew first-class for business travel and always

owned big cars. He told me once he liked Lincolns but preferred Cadillacs. He usually bought Caddys

used, held on to them for a few years, and then would find another deal.

Our need for another car did not

escape Dad’s notice and he

decided it was time for him to

get a newer, better Cadillac. He

offered to gift his ’74 Sedan De

Ville. I was dumbfounded and

very appreciative. Lori and I and

the girls we tickled to have a

Cadillac to drive. Like my Dad, it

was huge. The trunk could easily

hold six dead bodies plus all

your shopping from Costco. It

also had every conceivable

convenience: power everything,

climate control, nice sound

system, etc. This was the first car that I owned that I could not reach across and open the passenger

side door. It was 80 inches wide. I have often told friends that the Cadillac was the equivalent of

driving your living room downtown. The seats easily accommodated my Dad. Mom, on the other

hand always had two or three pillows on the front seat so that (after she moved the seat forward) she

could use a pillow or two behind her back so she could reach the pedals.

I soon found that there was a price to pay for owning a Cadillac. If normal maintenance on a normal

car cost $100, the same work on the Caddy cost $300. If tires for a Toyota cost $45 apiece, the Caddy’s

enormous tires cost four times as much. And the 472 cubic inch motor got about 12 miles to the gallon

downhill.

My recollection is foggy, but I think we kept the Caddy about a year after which one of my co-workers

offered me $1200 in cash for it. I asked my Dad before I sold it and he said, “Take the cash and run!”

With the cash, I made a down payment on a brand new Ford Festiva.

12. 1986 Ford Festiva

I was settling into my studies at Cal and the GTU and discovered that one of my classmates was

working at a Ford dealership in Berkeley. Lori and I went to visit him one weekend. Our intent was to

purchase a family car, but my friend talked us into the cheapest, smallest of the selections: the Ford

Festiva. We hemmed and hawed for a while until I asked him what kind of gas mileage I could expect.

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He told us we would get 33 to 39 mpg. We went in

and signed the papers. It was exactly what we

needed. The spacious interior belied its tiny

footprint. It handled us four easily and we still had

room for groceries. One cool thing about the Festiva

that still makes me giggle is that I could park in half

a parking space. Parking in and around the UC

Berkeley campus is coveted and is usually filled by

the early morning. Even local residents adjacent to

the campus have to get parking permits. I used to park the 11-foot long car between two cars parked

parallel on a neighborhood street when there really wasn’t a parking space there. I’m sure I was

cussed a few times, but I loved it.

All during this time, I still kept the Toyota Corolla.

A couple of years later, my first marriage came to an end. Cars and kids would go this way and that

until we settled into new and different lives.

The Festiva met its end some years later in Washington State. My daughter Holly, left the roadway

between Brinnon and Quilcene and ended upside down in the large ditch. The emergency response

crew cut her seatbelt and she came tumbling out … shaken but not severely hurt. She broke down a

couple of other times in Quilcene and we always felt she was “snakebit” as far as driving in that area.

I married Patty and moved to a flat in a Victorian home in Alameda, intent on finishing my PhD. She

had three children and I had Holly and Heather who chose to live with us for a couple of years. My

recollection is that Lori took the Festiva and I kept the Toyota. Obviously we’d need something else.

Patty and I purchased what I called the “orange crate.”

13. 1978 VW Bus (the “Orange Crate”)

A nice couple from the church we were attending heard about the “Brady Bunch” and sought us out.

They had a 1978 VW bus in very good condition for sale. After a test drive and some negotiation, we

bought the van. I had never owned a VW before and had to get used to its quirks (like the heater

never worked), but soon it became our people mover. We made several trips in the van and its

availability took the pressure off the Toyota, which soldiered on.

The van would easily seat all of us; there was even

room for more. Good thing. In early 1989, Patty

informed me that she was expecting a baby. That

baby, born in October, would change everything. We

would soon have six children and at least a few

months during which Patty would be unable to

continue working as a nurse. As the stresses

mounted, I decided to take a leave of absence from

graduate school and resettle Patty and the kids back

to Port Angeles, Washington where her parents and one sister lived. They would be of invaluable

support to Patty when the baby arrived.

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We loaded her, the kids, and what they could carry into the orange crate and they headed north. I

stayed behind to pack the big moving van myself. Happily we all survived the move, immediately

found a house, and I even found a job. On August 17, 1989, I began work at the Clallam-Jefferson

Community Action Council. CJCAC later became known as Olympic Community Action Programs or

OlyCAP for short. Not in my wildest dreams did I think I would work there for the next 22 years.

In the next year, Hannah Joy Hockett was born. My girls, Heather and Holly, began to take turns

staying with their mom. Patty’s kids, Heather, Hillary and Jonah were still pretty young and quickly

took their places at various schools in Port Angeles. I still remember one morning when I took Hillary

to school. She asked me to stop about a block away from the school so the other kids wouldn’t see

her alight from the orange crate. We laughed, but she wasn’t kidding at the time.

I usually drove the Toyota to work, but sometimes I was “volunteered” to take my van so that the

agency’s management team could travel together. One very snowy winter we all traveled to Quilcene

in the van. Remember the heater that never worked? I was called every name in the book as my

colleagues were forced to huddle together, blowing their breath on their hands and wiping fog off the

side windows.

The date escapes me, but I decided to buy another Ford.

14. 1988 Ford Taurus

Two or so years after settling in to Port Angeles, we traded

in the van for a Ford Taurus. The Taurus was one of the

most comfortable cars I ever owned. It seemed almost as

big as the Cadillac did and the soft upholstery was

extraordinarily comfy. I remember that I could have a

backache, go for a ride in the Taurus and the ache would

just go away. Talk about interior engineering! The most

significant thing I recall about the Taurus was that it was

completely nondescript. I used to say that I could rob a

liquor store and they could ask the employee for a

description of the car and he/she would say, “Well … um

… it was a late model … dark … um sedan … and um … I

can’t remember if it was clean or dirty … and it was kind

of a … um normal looking … um car.” See the pictures

and decide for yourself.

15. 1994 Ford Thunderbird

As years passed, the Taurus began to wear out from

the mileage. As I began to earn more money, I got

the hankerin’ to buy a Thunderbird. I distinctly

remember going with Patty to a Ford dealership

outside of Port Townsend. I had in mind buying a

used T-bird. After negotiating till eight o’clock at

night, we left with a brand new 1994 Thunderbird.

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I hadn’t felt that kind of enthusiasm for a car since my Jaguar. It was powerful, comfortable and

elegantly designed. The driver’s seat felt like the cockpit of a jet fighter. It was white with blue interior

and had power to spare. Living in logging country, where all kinds of debris found its way to

windshields and grills, I bought a black “bra” to protect the front end. I thought I had the coolest car

in town.

Working for Community Action required driving a lot every month. After six months on the job, I was

promoted to Division Director and oversaw a number of senior services, including six senior centers

and Meals on Wheels for two counties. If I visited each site only once per month, I would need drive

600 miles. My mileage reimbursements were in a category of their own.

It didn’t take a month before a log truck on the way to Forks kicked up a stone and put a star in my

$600 windshield. My assistant, who was riding with me, jumped as the stone sounded like a gun shot.

When we saw the 1” crack we both cussed. I loved the car, but only kept it a couple of years. I took

a beating when I traded it in on a two-vehicle purchase. Seems that cars driven off the showroom lose

considerable value in the first couple of years!

16. 1995 Geo Metro

My memory is a bit fuzzy as to what occasioned the

multiple auto purchases that came next. The T-bird was

fantastic, but gas prices continued to climb and its 21 mpg

average was getting expensive. Heather was getting old

enough that she needed a car and we had a small pickup

that I’d bought for Hillary that was to be traded in.

So, I went to a Chevy/Toyota dealership in Port Angeles

and traded in three vehicles to buy two. I think I traded

in the T-bird, the Ford Ranger (Hillary’s truck), and one

other car to purchase two new cars: a 1995 Geo Metro and a 1996 Toyota Tercel DX.

Because the Geo was the product of a collaboration between Chevrolet and Toyota (built at the

Fremont, CA plant), I thought it would be a very good quality car. I was wrong. I bought the equivalent

of a pop can on wheels. It would get around okay, but you could easily dent it. I found this out the

hard way when I allowed Heather to take it to the beach/woods for the Senior Getaway night for high

school. Some kid got drunk and decided to walk across the hood and top of the cute little car. His

weight caused dents all across the car. I don’t know who the biggest piece of crap was: the drunk kid;

the cheap car; or me for allowing it to be used that way.

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It got great gas mileage since it only had a 1L, 3-cylinder engine. I think we got about 40 mpg.

Sadly, it was a terrible, cheap car. It would not last long before I traded it. The other car I bought in

that same transaction, however, was a wonderful workhorse.

17. 1996 Toyota Tercel DX

We had spent the afternoon looking at

row upon row of small, efficient but

comfortable cars. I really liked the

Toyota Corollas, but at the end of one

row was a 2-door Tercel. The price was

very attractive as it was at the end of the

season. I got it for a bit under $10,000.

It was basic, comfy and reliable. It also

got a real 36 mpg day-in and day-out.

One fond and fun memory of the Toyota

is still with me. As mentioned above,

living in logging country is fraught with

stone tossing peril. Stones on the

roadway often made it to my Toyota’s headlights and I would have to replace them rather frequently.

I even had special tools (like an 18-inch-long and thin screwdriver) to reach behind the grill to get the

light out. One winter, my brother Terry came to visit. As we sat in my living room, catching up on

family drama, I remember saying, “Hey, I need to change a headlight. C’mon.” I got the new light off

my workbench in the garage and then went to the driveway to change the light. As I inserted my long

screwdriver into the grill, Terry smiled and said, “Timmy, what are you doing?” Remember, Terry was

a real mechanic. “I’m changing the light. Don’t worry, I’ve done this about a dozen times.” He then

asked, “Did you buy that long screwdriver just to do this?” I nodded. He then said, “See that little

plastic button right there? Push it.” I pushed it and the grill came loose, revealing the entire light

assembly and making it easy to change the light with my bare hands. I gave Terry a sheepish look. He

then asked with a smirk, “Do fender and body men look that smart to you? Do you think they have

super-long screwdrivers?” We both broke out laughing.

I still cherish the memory of my brother. He was a fantastic mechanic, and a very good-natured

person. He passed away in 2012.

I drove the Toyota till I got tired of it and then kept driving it. It stayed within the family and is still

under the care of my youngest daughter, Hannah. I think it has close to 200,000 miles on it now.

Illustrative of its reliability is the fact that I once let it sit next to the house for nine months. The tires

were starting to go flat and I decided to try to start it. It started right up. I spent very little money on

maintenance. A set of tires used to cost about $120!

18. 1994 Isuzu Rodeo

In the mid-1990’s we decided we’d get an SUV. Port Angeles had suffered a number of severe snow

storms and we had discovered camping. We felt we needed a safer, family-size vehicle with a lot of

traction to address these needs.

22


Patty and I went into a dealership and immediately fell in love with an Isuzu Rodeo. It was a luxury

model with leather seats and all the bells and whistles. It was two-tone and had full Costco capacity.

It’s four-wheel drive was amazing and got me through quite a number of snow storms.

In January of 2000, my sister Jeannie

passed away in Boise, Idaho. I went to

conduct a small memorial service for her.

On the drive back, I encountered a

massive snowstorm that halted most

traffic. Happily, the Rodeo plowed

through all the way back to Washington.

It was an amazing car.

By this time, I had become the Deputy

Director of OlyCAP, second in command.

I had decent income and could afford the

Rodeo’s 16 or 17 mpg. Frankly, most of

the time, I drove the Toyota back and forth to work, including the 46-mile trip to Port Townsend a few

times each week.

The Toyota was ever reliable, but eventually the Rodeo’s clutch began to go. In about 2002, we traded

it in on a Pontiac Vibe.

19. 2004? Pontiac Vibe

I wasn’t keen on buying a Pontiac until the dealer told me that the Pontiac Vibe was really a Toyota

Matrix with other badging. It was a pretty car, reliable and made a nice runabout. Patty loved the car

and it seemed reliable enough. It did have an annoying water leak into the cabin that I don’t think we

ever got sufficiently fixed.

The Vibe took a beating. One incident bears

repeating.

The main access to our house was off the alley

parallel to 12th Street. One afternoon a worker

driving a backhoe was making his way down the

alley toward our house while Patty was driving the

opposite direction. The backhoe driver had raised

the front bucket so that he could not see directly

ahead of him – bad idea. But, after all, it was an

alley. Patty pulled to the side of the alley which could only handle one car at a time, and the backhoe

tore into the side of the Vibe. No one was injured but a lot of damage was done to the Vibe. When

we called the police, the local officer was puzzled how to handle the case because it was not necessary

to have the kind of insurance on a backhoe that a passenger car needed. My recollection is that the

driver was not cited and the owner settled for just paying for the damage. All’s well that ends well.

Late in 2003, I was diagnosed with Colon Cancer. Our lives were jolted and the cancer experience

would propel me to make a car-choice I never expected.

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20. 2004 Chrysler Crossfire

Over the course of my fifty years of car ownership, the Crossfire was the most satisfying. It was good

for what ailed me. Hardly a day went by when I wasn’t accosted with the words,”Wow that’s cool.

What kind of car is that?” It reflected my personality to a T and consummated my life of automobile

ownership.

Having received promotion after promotion at OlyCAP and having received strong support from the

agency as I healed from cancer treatment, I was ready to return to work and get a dream car. Most

of the kids at home were teens or in the process of flying the nest. I thought I could pass along the

Tercel to the kids and buy something cool for myself.

The internet made searching for cars so easy. With some research skill, one could narrow the choice

of make and model and then find precisely where that car could be found. This applied to both new

and used cars. One day in June, 2005, I found a 2004 Chrysler Crossfire with only 5,800 miles on it for

sale for an amazing price. This car’s sticker price was about $36,000, but this car was being marketed

for much less. I quickly called Patty and told her about the deal. She said, “Get it. You deserve it.”

The big problem was that it was located in Lansing, Michigan. I called the dealership and arranged to

send a deposit. I also arranged for Hannah to join me on a flight to Michigan and a return road trip. I

gave her two cautions. First, I told her that she could bring luggage no larger than a shoebox. Second,

I told her it would either be a bonding experience or we’d kill each other, depending on the music she

chose to bring. Happily she complied. She brought a small suitcase and lots of James Taylor.

We flew to Chicago and drove a rental car to Lansing.

We discovered the dealership was closed, but the

salesman was willing to meet us and conduct the

transaction. We already had Washington State

license plates and happily took delivery. Hannah was

still learning to drive, but was happy to be my

navigator and co-pilot.

The trip home produced memories of a lifetime. We

traveled down through Michigan, taking a side trip to

see Lake Michigan. We visited Battle Creek and

Kalamazoo. Traveled through the corner of Indiana on toward Chicago. Soon we were on I-90. Facing

tolls on the trip, Hannah alerted me ahead of each

toll plaza. We departed Illinois, crossed Wisconsin

and then Minnesota. We found that we could drive

about 85 mph without bother from police. The trip

was smooth and fast. We stopped in South Dakota

at the famous Wall Drug Store and then visited

Mount Rushmore and the Crazy Horse monument.

We proceeded to Wyoming and enjoyed a

wonderful visit to Yellowstone. From bubbling

mud, to Old Faithful, to wild, gigantic bison, we

breathed in America. Heading north out of Yellowstone, we entered Montana. As the day faded, we

encountered a late-July hailstorm before we stayed the night in Butte. We left the next morning at

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7:30 A.M. We arrived at the Seattle ferry terminal at 3:00 P.M. We had covered 600 miles in less than

8 hours! When we arrived in Port Angeles, we were greeted with smiles and not a little awe of the

car.

Every feature of the Crossfire well reflected

the quality of its Mercedes heritage.

Daimler-Benz had purchased Chrysler and

had built the Crossfire on the Mercedes SLK

drivetrain. The leather interior was

awesome; the engine was awesome; the

handling was awesome; and … are you

getting my point? Patty was sure I’d get

tickets. I promised her I would not. Turns

out, she was right. Soon, my relatively rare

car became a fixture in town and a fixture

on the highway between Port Angeles and

Port Townsend. State Troopers kept a close

watch on me.

I could not resist the power and handling of the

Crossfire. It’s engine would propel the car to over 150

mph and it could turn on a dime. The car had almost

too many cool features to list. The front tires were

mounted on 18” rims; the rear tires were on 19” rims.

There would be no tire rotation. This meant tires wore

out more quickly. Not good when the 14-inch-wide

back tires cost $350 apiece! The engine required a full

8 quarts of synthetic oil … with oil changes costing $90

… not the Jiffy Lube $29. I didn’t care. I felt it was the perfect luxury car made for me.

On the maiden trip from Michigan to Washington one thrilling event occurred. We had left Cody

Wyoming headed west. Eastern Wyoming has lots of high prairie and open road. Hannah said, “Hey

Dad, this would be the perfect place to open it up.” I took the bait and proceeded to speed up. Eighty,

ninety, one hundred, one twenty, one thirty. That’s when I got scared. I was doing one hundred thirty

miles per hour. Hannah said, “C’mon Dad, all the way!” I looked at her and replied, “Hannah, if I hit

a bunny rabbit at this speed, we won’t come down till we hit the moon.” I backed off and never drove

that fast again.

A month into my ownership of the Crossfire, I needed to make a trip to the State offices in Olympia.

When a couple of staff came outside and saw my car they were awestruck. Maitri Sojourner then

made the comment, “That’s your Celebration-of-Life car, isn’t it?” She had remembered that I was

still recovering from cancer treatment. As I reflected on her comment, I had to agree. It was part of

my grateful celebration of life.

I owned the Crossfire for eleven years and put more than 170,000 miles on it. I enjoyed every minute

in it. It was driven fast right up till the last day. The day before we left for Ecuador, Sarah had to make

an emergency trip to L.A. to get USDA papers for our little dog, Marisol. She left at dawn, completely

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stressed, drove the Crossfire the “back way” to L.A. through Malibu, and walked into the USDA office

in L.A. when the doors opened. She then hurried home to help finish packing. The next day, Maria

Ramirez, a wonderful friend and leader at Community Action of Ventura County, picked up the

Crossfire that she had purchased from me for her lovely daughter as an 18th birthday present. We

waved to them as they left our parking lot. I had to fight back tears.

That departure marked the end of my car ownership.

Epilog

From skateboards to bicycles to car ownership, my life has been significantly affected by my wheels.

Having a brother who was a mechanic emboldened me to look under the hood, to try to take apart

and put together this and that. Nevertheless, I never became a mechanic. Having a best friend, Dave

Hanson, who really knew how to drive, emboldened me to learn to drive well. Nevertheless, I never

became a professional “driver.” That said, I loved my cars and the memories associated with them.

When I began driving, the cost of gasoline was about $0.32 per gallon. In 2008, I actually paid $5.00

for a gallon of gas just off the I-5 freeway near the SeaTac airport. I understand that gas prices have

fallen to about $3.25 per gallon in the U.S. In Ecuador, an oil exporting country, gasoline is not much

more than $1.45 per gallon. Alas, I’ve never bought fuel here.

So, that’s my life in cars. When we arrived in Ecuador we were resigned to either using our feet or

using public transportation. The bus costs $0.35 to ride to the nearest city. A taxi costs $1.50 for a

ride anywhere in or across town. I have lost 30 pounds from walking and now wear out shoes instead

of tires. Trust me when I say shoes are cheaper.

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Post Script

Here is a photo of the window sticker for my 1981 Toyota Corolla. What a fun piece of history!

auto-biography: my life with cars - wordpress.com · 2018. 11. 4. · auto-biography: my life with...

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