CARS (or - a can of worms!)

My very first car, the first one I bought, was a 1963 Rambler. I had to get a $150 loan at the Navy Credit Union to be able to buy it. Wow! It was a three-speed (three on the tree). It's color was white. I was living in Suquamish and commuting to Seattle for work. I needed a car so I could get from home to the ferry boat. While I was at work one day, my fiance hot-wired it and blew the clutch. So, I was carless (or, is that careless?), again.

I have tons of memories of cars. My dad had many, many different vehicles during the years I lived at home. We made a list one time of all the cars he could remember. It numbered well over 50! I think I need to get that list from him again.

Here are the vehicles that come to mind first for me:

• One-ton red farm truck - I'm sure we were the only family in our neighborhood with a farm truck. We packed our family of six into the cab. Dad let us take turns shifting. Sometimes, we got to ride in the back. I remember one time when our washing machine was broken. We loaded our laundry into the truck and drove through the city. Poor Mom!
• The Cun-O-Car van - Dad was a 'mobile' accountant. His 'office' was in a van, sort of like a bread delivery van. We loved going in it with him.
• Blue Fiat - it caught on fire one day when we were near 45th and Wallingford. The fire department came.
• Mom's T-bird
• The little, very old, black truck - Dad gave me a ride to school in it one day and all the kids on the playground ran over to the fence to see it.
• 1951 Ford three-speed I drove around Suquamish before I had a license
• Volkswagen bus - I was helping my mom with Avon deliveries right after we got it. Neither of us knew how to get it into reverse, but my friend, Dean Belgarde, happened to walk by just then. He drove a VW bug and showed us how. Embarrassing!
• Dad's Mercury (I think) - the headlights went out when the car was off, so when we were really low on fuel and Dad turned the car off to conserve, the headlights went off, too!
• GTO!! (but, I was married by then)

Just a beginning....