Driving Sports

Across America this day, families are gathering to celebrate Thanksgiving. The holiday was founded by our ancestors because they figured if we traveled long distances to get together with our relatives once a year, we’d give thanks that we didn’t live closer.

Time was, everyone’s relatives lived in the same town, or on a nearby farm. But not so in the modern world ­– we live at a distance, and the carriage of choice to bring us together is the good old family car. Everyone’s got childhood memories of piling into the dadmobile to visit grandma and the cousins. Unless your parents were far cooler than average, that meant a pretty dreadful day (or days) spent playing license plate bingo with your siblings, or worse.

So this Turkey Day, we present an encomium to those halcyon rides of yore. We have here five family cars we can all remember, but we would rather forget.

Number 5 – VW Beetle

This was the ride of choice if your parents met at Woodstock, or were graduate students who found themselves in an unexpected family way. After you came along, they made the annual turkey trot to beg your grandparents for rent money. In the frosty November air, the fumes from the monoxide brain damage device sadistically called a “heater” turned you into a drooling idiot in less than 30 miles.

Number 4 – Chevy Suburban

You had to grow up fast if your family owned one of these. Four wheel drive was a sure sign your dad thought he was some kind of latter-day Lewis and Clark. Over your mom’s shrill protestations, he’d announce you were taking a “shortcut” gravel road through Desolation Wilderness to shave an hour off the freeway time to your cousins. Of course, you got stuck and had to eat your crayons to survive, but eventually search and rescue came through.

Number 3 – Ford Pinto

It wasn’t that you were all that worried about getting rear-ended. It was that you and your two sisters were crammed into the back of this thing, along with all the luggage and a baking dish full of yams. It was six solid hours of hell. The worst part was that the girls got to proclaim a pee stop anytime they wanted, but when you had to go your mom just handed you an empty coke bottle while your sisters giggled. You’re still in therapy, aren’t you?

Number 2 - Dorky Minivan

Riding around in one of these proclaimed to the whole world that your parents had found religion, but never did learn to drive. Seems like every one of these came factory-equipped with a student-of-the-month sticker on the back. You get bonus dildo points if your family’s van had fake woodgrain stickers on the sides. The only redeeming factor about one of these is that you could hide under the luggage in the back and hope no one recognized your family on the road.

Number 1 – Big Ol’ Wallowing Station Wagon

Come on, admit it – every family had one of these. The rearmost bench seat faced backwards so you could try to get the 18-wheeler drivers to blow their airhorns, moon the dorky folks in the Minivan, and make your brother so carsick that he threw up on you while you were peeing in that coke bottle. The saving grace of the giant road-wagon is that you were so far away from your parents that by the time they stopped the car and hiked around back to slap you silly, you were old enough to leave home.

Happy Thanksgiving and safe travels to all our readers!

All photos are in the public domain  from Wikimedia Commons. You don’t think we keep this stuff in our library, do you?