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My Teacher, My CarApril 29, 2010 Malvina Forester isn't the first Subaru with which I've shared my life. That honor belongs to a 1980 wagon that came into my life in 1985. Here's the story. An earlier version appeared in the Martha's Vineyard Times in October 1989, accompanied by the cartoon at the end, drawn by my then girlfriend, the capable Maggie MacCarty. It's from To Be Rather Than to Seem, of course. Never mind that I grew up in the suburbs; until I reached the relatively mature age of thirty-seven, I had never had a car of my own. I lived in cities; I didn't need a car. That was my public explanation. Privately I was convinced that only a crazy person would risk owning a car without full certification in automotive mechanics. What if the car broke down in the middle of nowhere? What would I do? When I moved to Martha's Vineyard, during the summer of 1985, I intended to live on a shoestring, write, and get around as I had for twenty years as an occasional visitor: by bicycle, foot, and thumb. Then Linda, my father's ex-girlfriend who was now living abroad, offered me the use of her sturdy 1980 Subaru wagon. Freedom from cold, freedom from rain, freedom from expeditions up-island or to Edgartown that took half a day! My cluelessness about cars notwithstanding, I accepted. In early October, the car came to live with me at my winter rental on Beach Road in Vineyard Haven. The very next day I slung backpack over shoulder, grabbed the keys, and headed downstairs, anticipating a leisurely drive to Alley's General Store, which in those days still housed the West Tisbury post office, for mail and a cup of coffee. My mode of effortless transportation had a flat tire on the driver's side. I walked counterclockwise around the car, checking each wheel in turn. Three tires were properly plump. The left front was still definitely, implacably flat. My dire assumptions were confirmed. I'd never changed a tire and I didn't know where to start. This treacherous, unreliable creature could sit right where it was until Linda came back to the island in May. When my heart stopped pounding, I saw Courtesy Motors right across the street, next to the convenience store cum gas station. Compounding my usual reluctance to ask for help was the embarrassment of being a stereotypical woman incapable of dealing with cars. But the only alternative -- leaving the flat untended until spring -- would have meant total humiliation. Within twenty minutes, for the modest sum of $5, I was on my way up-island. The guys at the garage did not treat me like an idiot. They lent me an air can and showed me how to use it; I put air in the flat tire (this was no more complicated than inflating my bike tires) and drove around to the back of the garage, where my flat was duly replaced with the spare. Larry and the crew at Courtesy Motors have been my mechanics ever since. "When the student is ready, the teacher appears," goes the axiom. Did I suspect then that this burgundy Subaru was going to be one of my mentors? I knew it for sure that winter. Someone swiped the grille off the front end, I don't know when and I don't know where. The grille's absence caught my eye in the parking lot of Cronig's supermarket. I walked around the car three times, half convinced that I was hallucinating and the grille would be back in place when I came round again. I went into the store, bought my groceries, and returned to the car. The grille was still gone. As I drove home, my eyes scoured the side of the road. Maybe the grille had fallen off when I wasn't looking? I searched the cramped parking lot that my apartment shared with the boatyard and the health food store. Nothing. This time I didn't fantasize waiting till spring. Anger propelled me down the hitherto-unfamiliar road of police reports, insurance adjusters, and body shops. I glowered suspiciously at every Subaru on the road with grille in place: maybe one of them was mine? Maybe the island was playing Musical Grilles behind my back: when one person's grille was stolen, he stole one from someone else. Before my replacement grille came in, I was terrified that sand would blow in, clog the radiator, and destroy Linda's car. This new worst-case scenario replaced my old favorite -- two tires blowing out simultaneously on Old County Road. One bright Labor Day weekend, late for a supper party, I ran to the car, turned the key -- nothing. The parking lights were switched on; the battery was quite, quite dead. In miraculous time I hitched from my summer digs (near West Tisbury village) to the party (off County Road in Oak Bluffs). A friend lent me her plug-in battery charger. By morning The Kid was juiced up and starting, no problem. One night barely three weeks later, I was pulling into Lambert's Cove Road after a fall equinox celebration and the world went so suddenly, totally dark that I feared for my eyes. Panicky fumbling with the controls yielded the answer: my headlights were gone. By the flash of my hazards I backed to the safety of the shoulder of the road. The next morning I was back at Courtesy Motors, learning about fuses, automobile division. Apparently my trickster car had more than fuses on her mind. The casual acquaintance who gave me a ride home the night the headlights failed shortly thereafter became my accomplice in what is euphemistically called a "serious relationship." Before the Subaru and I went our separate ways, I killed the battery one more time: having mastered the recharger, I was now introduced to jumper cables. Not long after, on a night so cold that metal rattled hollow, the fuse blew again, this time on Beach Road near the hospital, fortunately the best-lit stretch of road on Martha's Vineyard. The next day I bought a pack of fuses and fixed it myself. Late in the third off-season of my apprenticeship, The Kid realized that I was ready to fly. Linda's eldest daughter and her husband would be spending the next winter on the island; they would need the car. I now knew that you didn't have to be an auto mechanic to own a motor vehicle, but knowing a good one was a definite plus. By the end of the summer I was able to lay money down on a new, blue Toyota pickup with four-wheel drive: my first very own vehicle, the first for which I alone was responsible. I named her Tesah, after the state-of-the-art starship in R. M. Meluch's first novel, Sovereign. Why a pickup? I'd moved eight times in the previous three years, and in my circle moving twice a year was a fact of many people's lives. Pickups came in handy. Besides, pickups were cool -- and pickups were very Martha's Vineyard. I was still playing the island by ear: If I can find work and housing, I told myself, I'll stick around. When I bought Tesah in August 1988, I had two reliable part-time jobs: proofreader at the Martha's Vineyard Times and chambermaid at the Lambert's Cove Inn. I had a girlfriend, I belonged to a women's group whose regular meetings offered camaraderie and discussion, and I'd just started putting my theater experience to good use as the Times's regular theater reviewer. I didn't move again until the spring of 1992. I was beginning to put down roots.
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