When I was still a teenager my dad just came out one morning and told me that I was buying a car! He insisted that I pool the small amount of hard earned money that I had accrued and invest it into my very first set of wheels. To help, he even drove me around to places that had advertised in the Saturday morning paper to inspect and purchase this automobile. Why on earth he would even consider such an option came as a bit of a surprise to me.....after all, I had perfectly good parents who dropped me off and picked me up everywhere. But still, under duress, I agreed!
In my head, of course, I had envisaged a flash, shiny and almost new car. One that had people's heads turning. My friends who had purchased vehicles were all driving cars that one would term 'interesting' or 'cute' or 'cool'. Brands like VW, Mini and the like were common....all great students' cars and all with 'hip' classifications! Somehow, my first motor investment wasn't quite so swish. I ended up coming away with a not-so-new, not-so-shiny and definitely not-so-hip Hillman Hunter!
Now, I know that these days, Hillman Hunters have a kind of quaint and collectible appeal to some. Back in the mid eighties for a teenage girl though, they didn't! But still I drove my little white beast around cause, apart from walking, she was the only transport that I had! And beast she was! Her paint work, while once must have been sparkling white, always had a dull, powdery sheen while she was in my possession! And the interior was simple and (to put it nicely) merely serviceable!
Throughout the three years that I owned that car, I can say that life as an automobile owner wasn't dull. Money always needed to be spent on her....albeit small and wear-and-tear things like new tyres, a tune up here and there and (ahem) a new clutch (but we won't mention the lecture I got about 'riding' the clutch after this little mechanical failure)! In those days, fuel was averaging about 30-40c per litre so thankfully those costs were down. And although I can't remember what price registration was, I can guarantee that it was the astronomical $800+ per year that the Queensland Transport Department thinks is perfectly acceptable in 2009!
By the end of my time with my Hillman, it had seen all sorts of auto events......a few little prangs (who ever did invent posts in car parks that were impossible to see out of back windows!), storms (the hail damage from the very large storm in the summer of 1985 pocked cars all along my street...except mine! The steel on the Hillman was so strong that it barely scratched when marble sized hail landed on it!) and theft (someone broke into it, only to find about 50c in the glove compartment! Obviously, they didn't want to take the car as a whole!). I even remember once when my friend and I were driving in it that we smelt rather nauseating petrol fumes. Logically, we wound down the windows to let the fresh air in, only to realise after a few kilometres of driving that the fumes were actually coming from the outside of the car.....so we wound the windows back up again!
A few years later, after I finished university and got an actual job that didn't involve flipping hamburgers and cooking chips, I bought a new car. My Hillman owning days had come to an end. And to give you an indication of the sad state of my car, I eventually sold it to a wrecker for a couple of hundred dollars! I didn't cry and I didn't miss it....it's only now, all these years later that I realise that that little 'bomb' was probably a great, inexpensive car for a newbie driver like me!
Today, as I drive my considerably newer car around, I realise just why my dad insisted that I needed my own wheels. My life these days fits in between driving my children to their own life events.......to school, from school, to sports events, parties and now work. I even got a 'Mum, I missed the bus, can you come and pick me up!?' call last week! Obviously, my children aren't old enough to drive themselves yet, hence the need I have for one of those 'mum's taxi' bumper stickers. I admit though that once they are old enough, a good sturdy second hand car is what they will be getting, too!
Image courtesty of http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MHV_Hillman_Hunter_02.jpg for study purposes only.
