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First Car
Introduction to the Swedes
Volvo 122S
Saab 900
First Car
Like most men in late middle age, I have owned quite a few cars in my time. But the best stories have to do with the first three.
My first car was given to me by my father upon my graduation from college in 1965. It was only slightly used (it had 1500 miles on it and that in dollars is also what it cost) but it was in mint condition. It was a zippy, sporty little maroon runabout with four on the floor (very unusual for that time.) Its air-cooled engine was in the rear, which gave the car excellent traction. In short, it was a wonderful first car for a young man who was foot-loose and fancy-free.
And what do you think was the make of that automobile? Well, the position of the engine narrows it down considerably. Was it a Porsche perchance? Wishful thinking -- but unlikely at that price. A Volkswagen -- perhaps a Karmann Ghia? Nice styling, but this would hardly merit the accolade of 'zippy'! No, it was neither of those. So what is left?
Perhaps the reader is smiling at this point - a supercilious, pitying smile: (s)he knows, but is too discrete to say anything. And, indeed, what can be said? Ralph Nader's book 'Unsafe At Any Speed' had come out the year before -- my father must have known about it. Yet he bought his son this car! All that I can say in his defense is that he himself owned no less than three of these motorized menaces (all in elegant-if-macabre black). And clearly he was not a man to allow mere facts or damning data to stand in his way: he enjoyed his, and so, ipso facto, I would enjoy mine too.
Well, the amazing thing is, I did enjoy mine! It took me on far-flung trips to schools in South Carolina and West Virginia and beyond. When I was caught in a blizzard on an interstate in Ohio and plowed into a snow bank, its wondrous rear-wheel drive pulled me out. And, Mr. Nader's admonitions notwithstanding, I never knew it to fishtail. I was involved in one accident with this car (detailed in 'Accident'), but that would have happened with any car.
So yes, all in all, I loved my Corvair!
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Introduction to the Swedes
A friend of mine, Murph Shapiro, recently read me an entertaining tomb he had written up many years ago called 'Me And My Volvo'. Therein he recorded, in page after excruciating page, all the horrible things that went wrong with his car (he owned the infamous 164 model), including the exact amount of each of the multitudinous repair bills. Unfortunately, the much-anticipated violent climax (pulverization at a train crossing seems a fitting end for that claptrap) never comes: Murph says that in fact he does not recall what happened to his hapless red beauty.
In the cases of my two Swedish cars, I have decided to take the opposite tack from Murph: I would only1 speak of eschatological (final) things related to my Swedish cars. For I remember all too well what ultimately happened to them: they both came to violent ends.
I have heard that the suicide rate is very high in Sweden. As if in illustration of this, one of my Swedish cars did in fact commit suicide. (The other was kidnapped and murdered.)
But on to the Swedes!
Footnote:
1Since each car had its flaws, I do speak of those briefly in my narratives.
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Volvo 122S
When I bought this car in 1968, Volvos were touted for their longevity and ruggedness (it was claimed that they would last 11 years. Of course the dealers tried to get you to trade them in as soon as possible.) This automobile did not yet have the upscale panache it later acquired. As for myself, I bought one because I liked the looks.
The model Volvo I bought was the 122S; 1968 was the last year this comely model was manufactured. It was easy to see why: the design was the miniature of something right out of the 1950's. The front fenders were curved and separate from the rest of the car. The hood, nicely sculpted to come to a rounded point, looked like an upside down boat. And the taillights, distinct of shape and tint (there was some amber in them), set off a cute little trunk.
My car was white, with ruby red seats. This was not my first choice in colors; I had seen a lovely one in brown and beige at a dealer's near our house. But my father persuaded me to go to a dealer much further away with a less-desireable color because they promised to give me $50 more for my Corvair. (NB: That was the last time my father would be involved in my car buying. From this point on I would make all the disastrous decisions without his help.)
This model had a hand choke. And twin carburetors, making it tough to tune. But the wonderful seats made up for these inconveniences: they were adjustable, by means of roll knobs, for angle of recline as well as contour. They also had head rests -- the first year for this innovation.
The car did have one flaw from the first day I bought it: its tank leaked gasoline underneath. When I brought it back to the dealer, he said, 'Well, there are two possible responses. The first is to do nothing, to simply live with the problem.' I asked what the second option was. 'We would have to empty the tank of gasoline; flush it with water for eight hours to make sure all the gas is gone; and then weld it shut.' I replied, 'Happy flushing!' That solved the leak underneath; but there always seemed to be a gas smell in the car (I suspected it of oozing up under the trunk.) And, given the amount of smoking that took place in that car by me and my friends, I am surprised the car did not blow up at some point!
I had it for nine years; I would have made it to the mythical eleven had not fate intervened. (Some, my wife perhaps included, might wish to substitute other words for 'fate', such as 'carelessness', 'irresponsibility', and even 'criminality'. I think I'll call it 'an oversight' and leave it at that.)
There was a coffee shop in Harvard Square in those days called The Coffee Connection. It served any of a number of exotic coffees in individual Meliors (glass-and-nickel coffee presses) to the coffee lover. There I had the most exquisite mug of coffee ever -- one so rich that when I added pure cream, it became less rich. (I immediately bought the Melior and a bag of those beans, freshly ground. But at home it wasn't nearly as good as it had been in the shop: Cambridge water?)
(Note: The Coffee Connection was bought out by a West Coast fast-food chain called Starbuck's. No comparison.)
One early summer's evening in 1977 I set out for The Coffee Connection to drink coffee and write. I parked the Volvo next to the Harvard Lampoon building -- that updated version of a small medieval castle. I guess that I was anxious to have my coffee, for I suspect that I may have forgotten to remove the key from the ignition. I never locked the car itself; after all, who would want to steal such an anachronism? (I should have known better, since I was regularly treated to people approaching me at stop lights asking whether I wanted to sell my car.)
At the Coffee Connection that evening I not only thoroughly enjoyed a mug of coffee, but I wrote a searing paper which performed a word-by-word social-political critique of the seemingly-mundane phrase: 'JOHN IS DRINKING FROM A CUP.' It was brilliant and original, but is now lost -- fortunately.
When, fresh manuscript in hand, I came back to the Lampoon Building to retrieve my car, it (the car) was gone. Or so I thought at first. My heart stopped, my brain popped, my stomach had that sinking feeling...
But then a sly smile stole over my face. Ha! I hadn't parked the car where I thought I had at all! It was all a big joke on myself! The simple fact was, my car was elsewhere, in some Other Place. After all, matter can be neither created nor destroyed!
However, there are only so many Other Places to check before one runs out of Other Places. In fairly quick order I ran out.
Whether or not matter had been destroyed, at that point I surmised that my car had been stolen.
The next day we (yes, my whole family was affected by my careless behavior) were told that our car was found in Roxbury. I rode over there with a wrecker. My beloved Volvo was sitting in an empty lot; it had been stripped of its fenders, its grille, its front seats, and anything else that had value on the parts market. The child's seat was in the center, and it seemed clear that they were just about ready to torch the car when they had to clear out.
Two Roxbury policemen pulled up beside me as I was inspecting the damage. The one in the passenger seat was an older cop, a seasoned veteran. He gave me a world-weary look, and asked point blank whether I had left the key in the ignition. I protested that no, of course I hadn't. His eyes seemed to bore right through mine, and I could tell that he did not believe me, any more than Mrs. Kalijarvi had believed me about that cribbed paper in high school.
A few days later I received a call from our insurance agent. He told me that my car had been declared a total loss. He asked me what I thought my car was worth? I asked him what the book value of the car was; but he told me that the proverbial book didn't go back that far. Then he repeated the question:
'How much do you think your car is worth, Mr. May?'
Now I didn't think that my car was worth very much. After all, it was nine years old, and had 155,353 miles on it. So $400 seemed like a fair market value to me.
But I knew that I was speaking with an insurance agent; and that, since he would want to get the best deal for his company, said agent would no doubt attempt to undercut any amount that I might suggest. So I reasoned to myself: 'If I say $400, he will offer me $200. So if I really wanted $400, I had better say a higher figure.
The problem was, I was a poor negotiator. Part of this had to do with -- you guessed it -- my father, who was always attempting to get something for less (or sell something for more.) But surely a good part of this reticence had to do with the fact that, quite simply, I was a cowardly wimp.
But for once I was determined to stand up for my rights. And so I stated (a bit meekly), '$700?'
'Mr. May!' he barked, and I said to myself 'Here it comes!' But instead he continued:
'I think your car is worth a thousand dollars!'
I decided not to retort 'Are you crazy?!' and so I simply thanked him gratefully. But I must admit I was intrigued: why would an insurance company pay me two-and-a-half times what I knew my own car was worth?
I found out the probable answer when I received the mileage disclaimer to sign. It read:
'I swear that the odometer reading of 55,353 is the correct one, and to the best of my knowledge has not been tampered with in any way'.
And then it hit me: the Volvo had no hundred-thousands digit; when it reached that point, it had simply turned back to zero. Such a possibility had apparently never occurred to the insurance company.
So I signed the statement. Did I swear falsely? No: 55,353 was the correct odometer (though not mileage) reading.
Note: I could not complete this tale without mentioning the name of that fair and just insurance company: it was State Farm. Like a good neighbor indeed!
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Saab 900
Wishing to maintain our relationship to Swedish cars a bit longer, we bought this car from a used car lot in 1977 after the kidnap-murder of the Volvo. It was navy blue and had deep lush blue velour seats. But I was most attracted to how it drove: I always felt like I was sitting astride a crouching tiger. It was far and away the most exciting car I have ever driven.
Unfortunately, my wife Dorothy did not share these manly romantic attractions to a superb driving machine. For she was the one who kept the books, and thus was all too aware of the astronomical costs for the frequent repairs.
The problem was, the car was flawed when we bought it. Apparently someone had poured something into the radiator which gunked it up. As a result, the engine could not be cooled properly. (We still recall a grueling trip up to Lake George with two small kids: what should have taken five hours took fourteen instead, as we had to stop periodically to allow the car to cool down. And then, once we were up there, the head gasket blew...) As a result, I always drove with one eye fixed uneasily on the temperature gauge.
Then an unrelated problem showed up: over Thanksgiving weekend in Washington, D.C. my brother-in-law noticed that the carburetor (this was one of the last Saabs to have one) was spewing forth raw gasoline. Once we got back home I had the problem addressed and solved -- I thought.
I was driving into Boston on Storrow Drive one Saturday morning when I noticed the temperature gauge climbing up toward the red. Cursing, I was able to use one of the pull-off spots near the BU Bridge. I raised the hood -- and saw that the engine looked like a barbecue: it was in flames. 'This is very interesting!' I muttered as I backed hurriedly away from the car.
Someone must have called 911 on that day before cell phones. Fire trucks soon pulled up, their sirens whining. And one hapless older M.D.C. policeman appeared in a beat-up car that didn't look much like a police cruiser, and in a uniform more aptly displayed in a Keystone Cops routine. He invited me to sit in his car behind my poor car.
As he smoked an unfiltered cigarette and coughed his lungs out, this knight of the constabulary balanced a clipboard on the steering wheel to fill out the accident report. He had already asked me some questions.
'So, Mr. May, what (cough) year is your car?'
I don't know why but we both glanced up together. Through the windshield and barely twenty feet in front of us was a scene of the utmost carnage. Firefighters, enveloped by thick black smoke, were chopping out the windows of the Saab with fire axes and pouring streams of water into the car. It was a tableau out of some sort of purgatory.
The older gentleman next to me cleared his phlegm-coated throat in embarrassment. Then he said, with no trace or intention of irony:
'I mean (hack hack), what year (hack) was your car?'
But he was a kind man, this M.D.C cop. I took him up on his offer to drive me back to our apartment in Arlington. He dropped me at the corner and I walked into the kitchen. Dorothy was there peeling carrots.
'Oh hi Hon,' she greeted me brightly, 'I didn't hear you drive in!'
Note 1: The fire happened at the beginning of winter school vacation. By coincidence, I had just been told by the so-called principal at Chelmsford High School that I wouldn't be rehired for the next year. And the situation with our landlord had become intolerable at the moment of his attempted molestation of my wife. So the following week would be the only one in our lives where we'd be consulting all three major listings in The Boston Globe: Automotive (Presidents' Day sales), Real Estate, and the Help Wanted Ads.
Note 2: This was the first front wheel drive car I had ever driven (such cars were rare at the time), and I found it to be an exciting alternative. It also proved to be useful at a critical time in our lives. When Dorothy began having labor pains with our daughter Heidi, we left for Women's Lying-In Hospital in Boston on the night of January 21, 1978. One of the storms that would culminate in the great Blizzard of '78 was happening that evening. We found that Storrow Drive had only one narrow lane cleared. And then when we got off at the Fenway, we found that it wasn't plowed at all! But the Saab barreled through, its front-wheel-driven tires gripping the snow.
Note 3: The foibles of this car helped to further my literary education. I recall one early summer evening when I was driving back alone from Lake George. The temperature gauge began to rise when I was about halfway up the long climb to Killington, VT. I pulled over, opened the hood, and sprawled out on the grass in front of a motel there, where I proceeded to read most of 'Past Masters', a collection of early essays by Thomas Mann.
Note 4: State Farm gave us a fair price for this car too. The ugly little question -- that I seemed to be violently disposing of a string of automobiles -- never came up. Would they have been any more suspicious had they known about the problems with this lemon, and my dreams of torching it?
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