Toyota Corolla -The Energizer Bunny

It was time to buy another car. HarleyDad had been offered his first job after law school. He had been through 3 years of Ford Maverick hell.

Sometimes good things come in non-assuming packages. HarleyDad, a sadder but wiser car owner, decides to investigate reliability rather than auto "sizzle." So off to the Toyota dealer we go and find a Toyota we can afford. As a test from On High, it is in a "brown" color-perhaps my all time hated colors for cars.

So HarleyDad, who was born for sportscars and Harleys, has a non-descript small Toyota. Don't disparage small things. If my Maverick was a car from hell, then the Toyota was a car from heaven. The Toyota ran on one quarter of the Maverick's gas. It was small and you could park it anywhere. And it never broke. It must have thought it was the "Energizer bunny." It ran and ran and ran. I believe I kept this car for five years and the only time I ever replaced anything, it was the waterpump which went out on the fourth or fifth year I had it. Tires and batteries were cheap.

I had seen the light. Like many of my countrymen, I had experienced the quality revolution that Japan was forcing on the U.S. by making cars that actually worked and did not have to be repaired at the drop of a hat.

All the metric tools I purchased to work on this car (I had become my own mechanic thanks to the Maverick) just lay in the garage. (By the way, work in a garage is a wonderful think; I had tried it outside in freezing weather while in law school, and it was not a pretty experience.)

After Brokerbelle and our two children were through with the Corolla, we gave it to Brokerbelle's mother who also used it for a number of years without problems. She only had one problem with the car-she hated the color and she painted it red. Finally Brokerbelle's mother and I agreed on somethings so the Corolla even brought unity into the family.

The 1973 Corolla was an unassuming, even an humble automobile, but it had the Christian virtures of being faithful and perseverent. It was much more about being good than looking good.

When I look back and contrast the Corolla with my Maverick, there are many lessons to be learned. The Corolla taught me to love a car that did what it was supposed to do and did it well--it ran, kept on running and did it economically and faithfully. Here's to the 1973 Toyota.

HarleyDad