“Good gosh almighty!  Just a stunningly beautiful wagon,” Rex Hall, the pharmacist here in Fort Stockton said when this 1959 Mercury Park Lane came up for auction on Bring a Trailer.  “Hadn’t seen one of these in years, especially not one in this good of shape.”

I nodded in agreement. The Ford Motor Company produced some of my favorite wagons, favorite cars ever in fact, from 1957 to 1964. The Country Squires and Colony Parks of those years were a sight to behold then, and they still are now. The colors and chrome. The gadgets and woodgrain. The dashboards up front and the third rows in the back. I always felt like it was the ultimate expression of the American Dream on wheels. The Ol’ Man never agreed. He was never a wagon man. His preferences ran to coupes and sedans. That may have been due to the fact that wagons were usually the most expensive offerings that Ford had on the showroom. Right up there with convertibles. We never had one of those either. “Wagons rattle after six months. A convertible is ridiculous in Texas,” he’d say.

Being older, wiser, and having raised kids of my own, I have a better appreciation of a lot of the Ol’ Man’s views. But I’ve owned a couple wagons anyway, and fully appreciate every benefit they have to offer. None ever had wood grain slathering their flanks, rocket shaped taillights, nor a dashboard festooned with knobs, levers, buttons and chrome like a Colony Park, but my love for wagons was not diminished. Had a convertible, too. The Ol’ Man was right on that one. The Texas sun will burn the hair right off the top of your head in August with the top down.

“Just seeing one of these reminds me of a completely different time in America,” Rusty chimed in.  “A damned better time, if you ask me.”

Again, I had to nod.  Made me want to play some Nat King Cole on the jukebox, but then I remembered there was no Nat King Cole on the jukebox.  I need to talk to Lucinda about that.

“Can’t help but see that Canton Red Mercury and think about Doris Day and Rock Hudson driving it on some adventure that would have made me laugh for two hours straight,” Lucinda said as she filled up all the cups with some fresh Folgers.

Perry Silverman was even taken in by the Colony Park; reflective in ways that were unusual for Perry, though he’s gotten a lot more philosophical the older he’s become. “Don’t think there was a Colony Park in the movie, The Thrill of it All, but it would have fit right in. When James Garner drove his ’58 Chevy Impala right into the pool that he didn’t know they’d built in his backyard, I laughed as hard as anything I’d ever laughed at before. That was years before James Garner was Jim Rockford, but he was still one of the best.” Didn’t take Perry for a sentimentalist, but shouldn’t expect any less from someone who cut his teeth on Packards and Kaiser Darins.

The effect the Colony Park had on those gathered around the big round table in the middle of the Grounds for Divorce seemed nearly universal.  “This one takes me back to a time that is gone forever.  Didn’t have to worry about school shootings,” Sister Thelma noted.  “Kids could play outside.  You could pile the neighborhood into the back of a Colony Park, or Country Squire, or Bermuda wagon and haul ‘em all down to the Prairie View Drive-In for some good wholesome entertainment.”

“And don’t even get me started on the politics. There wasn’t some old nut riling up the country with lies and innuendo and trying to turn Americans against one another, like you-know-who,” Sister Thelma went on. There was general nodding all the way around the table, although half the table thought she was talking about Trump and the other half thought she was talking about Biden.

Pastor Peterson seemed surprised at the level of emotions being served up by the big wagon and attempted to shift the Merc-O-Matic of the conversation into a different gear.  “Think back to some of the vacations you took in a big ol’ wagon just like this one,” he said.  “Or one similar, anyway.  There were only 5,929 of these ever made, so it’s not like they were on every corner.  Wonder how many ever were registered in Pecos county, anyway.”

“Seems like I remember dozens, if not hundreds of these driving around town during my childhood.,” Rusty Hammer from the hardware store noted. “I vaguely even remember taking a family trip in one all the way to Mount Rushmore. We were there when they had to close the park because of a shooting. Some couple was being chased all over the faces of the presidents up on the monument for some damn reason.”

All the comments made me hungry for the past.  And for a piece of apple pie.  Nothing goes better with America than apple pie.  My gaze wandered over to the glass display to see what was available.  While I was telling Lucinda to bring me the biggest piece of fresh apple pie available, put a slice of cheddar cheese on top of it, and heat it up just enough to make it warm, not hot, New Guy piped up.

“Ah yes,” he started.  “Lover Come Back, Send Me No Flowers, Pillow Talk, and all the other Doris Day & Rock Hudson movies.  Classic.  Golden Age of Hollywood, to be sure.  Only problem?  The perfect lives they created on film for all of us to enjoy and seek didn’t reflect any kind of reality.”  If I hadn’t ordered pie, I may have made my excuses and exited the cafe.

New Guy went on, “The reality of it? While Doris Day was filming those movies, she was being abused by her real husband at the time.  Rock Hudson, heartthrob of all American women, was as gay as a parade and later became the face of AIDS.”  

Where was that damned pie?

“The house used to film The Thrill of it All?” New Guy said as he looked over at Perry. “Ironically the same one used in Desperate Housewives fifty years later, 4355 Wisteria Lane. The reality, though, is that housewives were just as desperate in 1963 as they were in 2012. We just chose not to believe it.”

Perry hadn’t ordered pie and excused himself, “Look at the time,” he said.  “Didn’t realize how late it was.  Gotta run.”

“School shootings?” New Guy continued, oblivious to the buzz kill he had become.  “Remember Duck & Cover?  We weren’t afraid of a random lone shooter coming into the building when we were kids in the fifties and sixties.  We were afraid of a nuclear bomb being dropped on the jungle gym just outside the window and blowing us to high, holy hell before lunch.  Of the two, give me my chances with a single nut with an AR-15 over the Russians with an A-Bomb.”

Lucinda finally brought the pie.  I took a bite as soon as I could and burned the roof of my mouth.  Had to stay and let it cool before I could beat it out the front door in Perry’s wake.

New Guy turned to Sister Thelma.  “And politicians that were nuts?  The ones making up stories about boogeymen coming for our freedoms and ruining America?  You think that started in 2016?  Google Joe McCarthy.  You can just do that from your phone now.  It doesn’t require a trip to the library.  The guy was telling America there was a communist in every cupboard, ready to get his orders from Moscow and kill democracy.”

It takes a lot for Sister Thelma to get mad.  New Guy was discovering it didn’t take as much as we’d thought.  But he was on a roll.

“Rusty,” New Guy said, “You weren’t at Mount Rushmore when people were shot being chased by anyone. That was North by Northwest. Great Hitchcock movie, but also as far from reality as Doris Day and Rock Hudson. And if you had gone on vacation during that time period, you’d have likely driven through states where certain citizens couldn’t vote, drink from certain water fountains, or marry whomever they wanted. And if you had driven to South Dakota in a 1959 Mercury Park Lane, it would have gotten about nine miles per gallon and belched out enough pollution to kill a small forest as it made its way north. It would have taken quite a while, too, because I-35 wasn’t completed until 1982.” Rusty regretted ever mentioning Mount Rushmore.

“You know why you haven’t seen one in forever, Rex?” New Guy asked. “Because they were designed to turn into an obsolete, rusted pile of decaying metal within five years, so that you’d have to buy a new one to keep the cycle going. Your parents would have been embarrassed to still be driving it after five years, even if they managed to maintain it. That’s how it worked. That’s why the foreign car makers took over the market twenty five years later.”

About then, New Guy’s cell phone rang.  We only heard one side of the conversation, but it sounded like Mrs. New Guy, telling him to get his arse home.  He made excuses and left shortly thereafter.

“Sounds like they deserve each other,” Lucinda said as he walked out to his car.

“I’d still kill to be able to have this 1959 Mercury Park Lane sitting in my garage,” I admitted.

“I’d drive it to every Cars & Coffee held in southwest Texas, even if I never took it to South Dakota,” Rusty said.  “Who does he think he is, anyway?”

“Tough to argue with some of his points,” Pastor Peterson acknowledged, “Even if he’s as grating as fingernails on a chalkboard.”

“You know what they say,” Lucinda reminded us.  “There’s that one guy in every group.  If you don’t think there’s that one guy in every group, chances are you’re the guy.”