I Was a Female Motorhead

I love cars. I don't care if they're old cars, or new, shiny cars, or fast cars or minivans filled with kids. Somewhere, back in my teenage years, I discovered the allure of horsepower and exhaust fumes and the whirr of an internal combustion engine. Over time, I have come to appreciate the meaning of cars in my life. We all do that - when we sit playing "remember when," we say - "I remember 1984, I was driving the Oldsmobile then." I went through my lean Rambler Station wagon era, my carefree MGB convertible years, and I've settled happily into my Ford Explorer lifestyle. I change my oil every 3,000 miles. I check the water in the radiator. I rotate my tires. Carefree is a broken gas gauge; responsible is having the brakes checked.

Women aren't supposed to know cars. When I am at an antique car show, and I squat down to follow the line of a jet-black fender and admire some beautiful bodywork, men look at me as though I'm a visitor from another planet. I utter the words, "Bondo, overspray, rechrome" and testosterone-fueled eyebrows raise, unmascara-ed eyes roll. I have been offered many rides in those lovely polished dinosaurs, but never once has a man said, "Want to look under the hood?" Sorry, buddy... I don't want to take a spin; I want to drive. As women, we are offered the mystique but forbidden the mechanics. I want to see the delicate balance of carburetor and manifold, hear the purr of well-sealed pistons, and revel in the "thwop thwop thwop" of a Chevy short block in low gear.

These shows remind me of an old boyfriend who was a mechanic, and a good one. While our friends went to the movies on Saturday nights, we went to the garage. We passed countless hours listening to the radio echo in those bays, tearing down some old engine, rebuilding another one. What satisfaction there was in seeing those laid out parts become something whose very purpose was power.

Ah, Power. Perhaps there's a clue there to the mystery of my attraction. My life is bound with appliances: washer, dryer, dishwasher, pumps of every description, mixer, can opener. But those motors are virtually powerless. The difference between a motor and an engine is that a motor doesn't really let you go anywhere. Within an automobile engine lies the promise of adventure, of exotic places, and sometimes, of escape. The main character of the film Thelma and Louise was the Thunderbird convertible. Those women could not have adventured in a Greyhound bus. The car was the thing. It offered them a promise of freedom. They didn't jump off of that cliff. They drove over it. Power.

Perhaps this word, power, explains my soft spot for old cars. Oh, not the ones you would guess. Granted, the antique MGTDs and opera-windowed Thunderbirds are beautiful and sexy, but I want to spend my time poking around the GTOs and Chevy IIs and Road Runners. I want to see cars whose main purpose was to Go, and to Go Fast. When I was growing up, the boys all carried copies of Hot Rod magazine. We girls had Seventeen, and Mademoiselle, and the message was clear: Boys got grease under their fingernails; we got lipstick in rear view mirrors. My mechanic friend was baffled the first time I stuck my head under