Page 35 - Oct 2022

[Here's where I add that both of our vintage
Volvos have manual transmissions and all our kids
learned to drive them when they were to get their
driver?s license. They also came home in one from
the hospital where they were born!]

Jennifer and I departed THAB early Thursday, Sept
8, while Melinda and Dottie left at 3 pm that same
day. Needless to say, driving a 61 -year- old car on
Interstate 40 East was somewhat harrowing; trucks
passed us doing 80 mph (we drove only 65 mph)
and the combination of speed, weight and length
tended to push us toward the side of the road. The
stability of a car with a suspension system
designed in 1944 is not like that of a modern car. ,
We wandered to the left and then to the right as we
drove the 380 miles to Hickory.
The weekend weather forecast for the southeast
was rain, unfortunately. As we approached Hickory,
the first drops came down for about five minutes
causing us to have to use the windshield wipers. "...t o my s ho c k , no t o nl y d id
I'd never had to use the wipers in my two years of t he wip er a r m c o me o f f in my
owning this green Volvo. ha nd b ut it a l s o b r o ug ht
While the 544 is far from a garage queen, I'd never p a r t o f t he d r iv e mec ha nis m
taken it out of the Magnolia garage if it was wit h it . This s ho ul d d ef init el y
raining or even if it looked like it was going to rain. no t ha v e ha p p ened ."
When we turned on the wipers, I immediately
realized that they were not adjusted so as to avoid Ma r t in St ic k l ey!
slapping the chrome/rubber at the lower part of
the windshield as they reversed direction.
Arriving at the Marriott in Hickory, one of the first
things I did was to get out a big screwdriver and pry
off the wiper arm of the driver?s side windshield
wiper. It came off very easily (this is not normal as
I have done this many times with my other Volvos)
and to my shock, not only did the wiper arm come
off in my hand but it also brought part of the drive
mechanism with it. This should definitely not have
happened!

I attempted to reconnect the arm to the remaining
part of the drive mechanism but could not.
DISASTER! What to do? It would be raining the
next two days and it would be impossible to drive
the green Volvo without windshield wipers.
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