The Buick
My Great Aunt Franny [my mom’s dad’s sister] owned a super powerful Buick Skylark. an 8 HP… It seemed out of context for her. She would take it to the garage and the attendant would drive it to the bay and when he stepped on the gas, the gar would hit 80. Well, it went shockingly zesty anyway. When the car got old, Franny gave it to Mom. Mom loved that car and when it started to have problems, she teased that she wanted to bronze it and make it into a guest house at the cottage. Much to Don and my surprise, we came out of the house one day to see Mom’s old Buick with a big ribbon wrapped around it. She was giving us her Buick Skylark. We much appreciated the gift, as any young family would love to have a car given to them.
I remember yet the day we took the kids to Toronto from Pointe Claire in that old Buick. Once in Toronto, it started to make unusual noises and I suspected it was in it’s death throws. We were stopped by a police officer who asked appropriate questions like, who were we, where were we going and what was wrong with our car. We answered we were on our way to the scrap heap and we were planning to purchase a new car imminently. He was satisfied with that and let us go on our way. We did just that. We were sad to see the old car go, but the new Oldsmobile ’88 adequately assuaged our grief.
