Shifting gears

A couple of months ago, after much deliberation, we decided to buy a new vehicle. That in itself could be the subject of an entire blog post, but I won’t bore you with the details of our shopping experience. It wasn’t horrible, but it sure has changed in the past 15 years since we bought our last new car. For one thing, dealerships don’t keep as many models on the lot, so you can’t just walk around like a kid in a candy store and pick one out in your favorite color. Most times you have to order it and wait. And wait. Particularly if it’s a popular make or style. Life’s instant gratification as we know it in 2026 makes the waiting game less appealing than ever. Anyway, you’ll be surprised (maybe) to learn that we bought a pickup. Seriously. A small one, at that, but a truck nonetheless. We love it, and it has come in handy more than once since we brought her home. (I say “her” because she’s named Misty, as in “Misty Blue,” the 1976 classic R&B ballad by Dorothy Moore. You’ll get to hear it at the end of this post. (You’re welcome.)

If you don’t name your cars, perhaps you should stop reading now. It’s a thing with me. “Mustang Sal.” “Misty Blue.” Funny, Rebecca’s yet to name her nearly 10-year-old SUV. (I suspect she’s already stopped reading. Sorry, hon.)

About two weeks after we picked up the Ford Maverick – an AWD, gas 2.0L-EcoBoost model featuring a 4.5-foot bed – I saw an article about a new study related to driving manual transmissions over automatic. The headline: “Manual Transmission Cars Help Prevent Dementia.” Interesting.

Ford’s compact utility truck is an automatic. Never thought about asking if it came with a manual transmission. (It doesn’t.)

When I was 21, attending college and working summers at the UAW headquarters to pay for tuition since I graduated high school in 1978, I was fortunate to be able to afford a new car: a 1981 Volkswagen Rabbit with a diesel engine. Don’t ask me why it wasn’t gas. (I still have paperwork for the loan. Because, well, of course I do.)

It was a huge deal, and I remember sweating bullets at the $7,000 cost of the car and $200 a month payments for 36 months, which seemed like forever. With interest, it was the most money I didn’t actually have that I had ever spent.

My oldest sister co-signed, since Dad probably wasn’t thrilled that I’d ditched the giant silver gray, four-door 1970-ish Ford LTD with a discolored “Vintage Burgundy” vinyl top he’d found from a guy he knew at a Detroit-area dealership.

“You’re gonna need lotsa steel around you, babe,” he’d say about that luxurious, full-size sedan with a powerful V-8 engine. “Buy it!”

That thing was the size of a boat. Automatic transmission, of course, with the gear shift on the steering wheel. I could have lived in that car.

The car gods must have not been listening to my father because the much smaller VW Rabbit I bought was a … 5-speed manual transmission. Sweet. And something I didn’t know how to drive.

Dad had promised to teach me, but after an hour behind the wheel yelling “PUT THE CLUTCH IN,” we pulled into the driveway of that modest ranch home in Warren, Michigan. Near tears, I put the poor Rabbit in park.

“Out,” I said. “Please. Get. Out.”

I was determined to learn to drive this car on my own. And I’m sure Jimmy John was perfectly fine leaving Daughter #3 to it.

It took me nearly 30 minutes to figure out how to get the damn thing into reverse to back out of the driveway. I’m sure my mother was inside cheering me on. Dad probably grabbed a Stroh’s beer and turned on a ballgame.

Honestly, I didn’t get very far that day, but I later managed to learn how to drive a stick with the help of my friend, Cheryl. She and her husband owned a late model Dodge Duster with manual transmission. One of those extra-long gear shifters you might see on semi-trucks. Tight it was not.

She took me to a school parking lot. At first, it was a bumpy ride with jerky stops and starts, but eventually I got the hang of it. And best of all, she didn’t yell – even though I’m sure she wanted to.

That little car served me well, until it didn’t on the coldest day of the year one February night in Michigan. Then, the Rabbit died. Sigh. RIP, Bunny.

Nowadays, manual transmissions are rare, except for performance-based vehicles. Apparently, they represent less than 1 percent of new vehicle sales in the United States.

That’s too bad, considering that driving one may provide a remarkable health benefit: protecting against dementia by giving the brain a daily cognitive workout.

The new study is from Professor Ryuta Kawashima, who helped develop Nintendo Brain Age games, of the Tohoku University’s Institute of Development. According to Japan’s Best Car Web, the July 2026 study found that driving a manual transmission-equipped car can actually stimulate the brain’s prefrontal cortex in ways that an automatic cannot.

Through his research, Kawashima discovered that the physical sequence of going through the gears is particularly stimulating for the region of the brain that controls things like attention, decision making and memory.

Imagine something so ordinary requiring such complex physical and spatial coordination that it improves brain focus. Wow. Picture the area of your brain responsible for memory and the decision-making process lighting up like a Christmas tree!

I can see how this is possible, since your brain must be engaged each time you shift gears, press the clutch and push the accelerator – all at once. After a while, it becomes second nature. Still, you’ve got to think about doing it, even if it’s subconsciously.

That’s the kind of “workout” I can get behind. No sweat. Minimal jerking and stalling. And if it helps boosts my brain power, all the better.

How hard can it be to drive a stick again? Like riding a bike, I bet.

Or eTrikes, three-wheel electric bikes with pedal-assist and lithium batteries that hit top speeds of 20 mph. They aren’t just for oldsters any more.

But that’s a story for another time. Stay tuned.

(YouTube video: Fifty years after its release, here’s Dorothy Moore singing her hit song “Misty Blue,” performing live on “Don Kirshner’s Rock Concert” music variety show in 1976. Written by Bob Montgomery for singer Brenda Lee, who turned it down, the song was first recorded in 1966 by country artist Wilma Burgess. It reached the Top 10 in several radio formats, but Moore’s soulful blues version in 1976 peaked highest on the Billboard charts. Said Moore, a native of Jackson, Mississippi, “We did that record in one take. ‘Misty Blue’ was meant for me.” Moore turns 80 on October 13 and still performs in special appearances.)