It was sometime around late 1990 or early 1991. I was just 15. My father decided this was the car to get me started out. It was a 1980 Mercury Capri RS, with a 200 c.i. straight-6 and a 3-speed automatic (yech). My pediatrician (credited with saving my life when I was an infant by correctly diagnosing an illness as spinal meningitis) had purchased it new in 1980 for his then wife. It eventually ended up with their daughter. The car developed a leak in the heater core, which led to lost coolant being replaced with water, which led to an overheat AND a freeze. The head and exhaust manifold were cracked, and a freeze plug on the back side of the block pushed out. The car ran and drove, but it was ailing.

The car cost the princely sum of $200. I made some of that by getting a couple of cartoons published in the Providence Journal’s “Ourtoons” section ($25 each!). My mother contributed some as well, maybe about $75, although she wasn’t thrilled with the idea. It made its way into my father’s garage (after I drove it up and down the driveway a bit), and the teardown began. Out came the motor, out came the dash, and many other parts started to pile up in the corner.

Over the course of a year, my father and I rebuilt the motor. He bought a Ford Granada for $50 to snag some parts, most crucially the cylinder head. The emissions equipment got ditched (not my decision), the exhaust manifold was welded up, and the engine block was stripped down, acid dipped, and honed. Then, the reassembly with new rings, bearings, seals, and gaskets. My father knew how to do some, and I relied on the Chilton’s manual for the rest. Mistakes were made, sure, but we got the engine put back together and running by the time I could get my license.

By the time I had my permit, the car was on the road. I couldn’t afford insurance, so it saw limited use during the remaining time in high school, but it saw some. It got me to work as a dishwasher in a restaurant ($5.50/hr under the table!). And it got me to college at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs. I drove like hell, was lucky to have never wrecked, and to only get one speeding ticket. The back with the seat down and the hatch open also made a nice make-out spot with my high school girlfriend.

The car had its problems… my father had been unable to loosen the transmission cooling lines going into the radiator, so his solution was to cut them and patch them back together with rubber hose. The sharp cut edges of the tubing eventually went through the hose. We didn’t know to warm up the engine and re-torque the exhaust manifold hardware, so that started to fall off. The starter solenoid failed, leaving me stuck. The tow truck driver taught me how to whack it while turning the key so it would unstick and start the car. I caught the oil pan on a rock in my mother’s lower driveway, right at the drain plug, so that developed a nice leak. The power steering rack leaked everything out, so I pulled the belt and ran it without power assist. The A/C compressor clutch eventually locked up and burned up the belts (dual!) on my way back to Saratoga from NYC, so that got bypassed as well.

And, when my mother destroyed her Montero’s top end (which I ultimately fixed), I left the car with her when I went back to school one semester. My thanks for that was the car being left out in the winter and having a brake caliper freeze. When I repaired the brakes, I overtightened the front wheel bearings, and welded one to the spindle, meaning that whole assembly got replaced with a junkyard part. And I remember being so broke that I couldn’t even afford gas to get to work. I had no choice but to go pleading to my grandmother for assistance. She asked me to drive her to the bank. In the drive-thru lane, the alternator failed and the car died. She nearly saw me in tears that day. One day on I-95 in Warwick, I signaled for a lane change and the turn signal fell apart in my hand. Which, inexplicably, was also the horn; you pushed in on the stalk. And, a personal favorite, the gas tank started leaking. My brother had an ’81 Mustang notchback with a 4-cylinder motor that he blew up the differential in whilst driving me back to school. Mom had to come pick us up in Belchertown, MA and finish the trip. I got yelled at by an English professor for being late to class. I warned Bill the diff was making noise. So, that became a parts car that donated the turn signal switch assembly and the crucial gas tank. My mother and I swapped it out one night so I could get to work the next day. I was proud of the job I’d done. My father’s response? “Lucky you didn’t blow yourself up.” No, luck had nothing to do with it.

I grew to hate patching the car together, despite its fresh motor. When I left school, went through that terrible fall and winter of ’95-’96, and got the job on the boat, I gave the car away. I regret that to this day. I especially regretted it when I got off the boat a short seven months later – the plan had been for a year – and didn’t have any wheels. Ah, well. Live and learn. My furious father saw the car once after the fact, then never again. I’m still proud of having cut my teeth working on that car, though.