The little pinto that could...

My first car was a cute little blue Ford pinto that I'd purchased from some friends at church for $750. My dad co-signed the loan for me. I was 16, had a good job in a nursing home kitchen. The world was my oyster...

Luckily the previous owners had put in the little upgrade so that if the back bumper hit something, the car wouldn't blow up, because every time I backed it out of my sister's driveway, I almost always hit their electrical pole.

I attended an extremely small church school (I was the lone graduate that year) and would buy a cold buritto at the convenience store in the morning, leave it on the dash and it would be piping hot by lunch time. Boy was I flirting with food poisoning, or what?!

That car took me thru the first year or so of college and I loved it. I'd named it Cruiser after Tom Cruise. And I never spoke ill of it when I was in it. I did once and got a flat tire that same day.

We lived on a gravel road and one day when I raced out to the car to make it to class, I jumped in and suddenly found myself laying in the backseat! The latch that keeps the seat up had gotten jiggled so much from the washboards in the road that it had broken. Well, I was desperate and late for class, so I dug into my dad's garage and found a 5 gallon bucket of plaster. It fit perfectly behind my seat holding it up nicely! It was there for 4 or 5 months until my dad was furious because someone had run off with his plaster! When he found out where it was, he stuck in a bent nail and fixed the seat. Problem solved.

I lost a muffler on that road, had several flat tires and replaced them with $5 used tires, ran out of gas, stalked a boys house with it, got stuck in any snow with it... slid it into our muddy garden during finals week... ah the good old days!

Since I was commuting to college, I carpooled with a distant cousin of a later ex-sister-in-law, who turned into my best friend. She was going to the same college and was a commuting freshmen right along with me. She had exactly the same car as me! I think the color was green tho...

Since I'm a space cadet when it comes to remembering to grab the keys when you get out, she taught me how to tuck a wire coat hanger under the back bumper. And then if you locked the keys in the car, she showed me how to unlock it with that hanger. That came in handy more than a few times! Unfortunately a guy friend knew about this little trick. One day I walked back to the commons for my car and couldn't find it! I was panicking and happened to notice my best friend and the "guy friend" peeking at me from the business class building... He knew I used to keep a spare in the glove compartment, so he had broken into the car and pulled out all the cr*p in the compartment, spilling all the extremely personal items onto the floor. I was never so embarrassed! Well, I guess I have been since then... But up to that point... ! All was forgiven when he pointed out where he'd moved it to. He was almost as embarrassed as I was.

That little car reached it's demise one sad Spring day. I was making a left hand turn in front of the college, clicking the turn signal manually because it wouldn't work otherwise. While pulling gently on the emergency brake between the seats because my brakes didn't work otherwise.
It also couldn't go in reverse unless it had warmed up a lot. So I usually parked on hills or at least parked facing out as often as I could. It was a wonderful little car and I couldn't be troubled with little problems like this. Nothing could slow me down back then...

So anyway - back to the left hand turn... sorry - I tend to ramble.... I was making a left hand turn. Behind were about 5 or 6 other cars waiting for me. I was waiting my turn. As I turned, suddenly a car came out of nowhere, passing the 5 or 6 cars behind me and drove "OVER" the front of my car! Seriously, he drove over the front of the car! I was in shock.

Plus, he kept on going! Monster car or something... I never got a good look at it. Luckily a witness to the accident followed them to their home a short distance away and came back with the address info for the police report. There are good Samaritans everywhere!

I was fine and in control of everything. I filled out the police report, talked with various witnesses and finally walked down to the commons building, which was my home away from home, and saw my boyfriend. I told him what had just happened, I was still stunned. He was late for a class and just said Oh that's too bad and then he was gone. ???! He dumped me on my birthday a short time later, so it all worked out...

I got a hold of my dad on the phone. As soon as I heard his voice, I fell apart. He couldn't understand a word of my blubbering until I calmed down a little. I think, looking back now... that as soon as I had my dad on the phone, I knew that he would take over and make everything better. He did. I'm so lucky and blessed to have a dad like that!

Well my little Cruiser was totaled. Insurance paid $800 for it. I'd had it 4 years and I'd made a profit! If you don't count the interest I paid on the loan... We had it sitting along the side of the fence in our meadow for several years with weeds growing thru the engine. Then one day someone was driving by and it caught their eye. They offered my dad $50 for it for parts and he said, "take it away!" They ripped it out, weeds and all and took away my first real taste of freedom.