My mom’s car for most of my childhood was a PT, and when we moved to where I mostly grew up, our neighbor across the street had three of them, all of them had something special about them- two of them were the turbo GT model and the other was some other special limited edition. They were blue, orange, and yellow, all bright metallic colors, and all of them, even my mom’s more bland silver one was a limited edition and had special American Racing wheels from the factory with body color matched hubcaps and trim. The suede interiors were actually great quality as well.

I will say, they weren’t the best looking car, and they certainly weren’t the most reliable, especially the turbo models, and they definitely aren’t anything I’d want to touch myself, just not my taste either, but the scene back then was pretty wild and very diverse. We were out at some sort of PT club event almost every weekend when I was little.

I think it was really cool to have grown up among such a weird, niche car culture, and it makes me really appreciate that I found my own niche community around 3rd gen Camrys, since my first car was my grandmother’s 96 Camry that was passed to me in high school and has since become my manual swapped and soon to be turbo weekend project car after years of being my daily driver. I love weird niche car cultures so much. They just always seem to hit different, even if it’s a fucking weird ass or seemingly insignificant car lol.

And it’s always wild too to see what people will hold onto. Always good stories.