The love affair with the Holden car

is over.
I had to make a trip to the bank on Wednesday - after the trip to the dentist and the problem with the brake cable being locked to the other bike. It was definitely not a good day in that respect.
In the bank an elderly man dressed in a way which shouted, "Urban Aristocracy" was doing a complex transaction to assist his son. His son was buying one of the last Holden cars to roll off the assembly line - and yes, son was apparently paying for it. As I was a mere metre away I could hear all this quiet conversation with the teller. The elderly man actually turned and gave me a smile and shrug at one point. 
Had we not both been supposed to be concentrating on our own affairs I might have told him about my paternal grandfather and Holden cars.
I don't know much about cars so I don't know what sort of car my paternal grandfather had when I was born - apart from the fact that it was also a Holden. It was made in this state and he believed in supporting local industry.
I do remember the next car he bought. It was an "FJ" model Holden. It was cream and had red leather seats - yes, actual leather in those days. 
That car is seared into my memory for more than one reason. The first is a very early memory of my grandfather travelling to the place we were living in, a small town north of the city, to take me and my brother to safety. There were very serious fires in the area at the time. The heat was also extreme. 
I remember the journey to the city as being silent. My brother and I were frightened but compliant. We trusted "Grandpa" to get us to "Grandma" safely. (Our parents were following in our own car with Middle Cat in a crib and anything of importance packed. The Senior Cat told me once, "We didn't know if there would be a house to go back to." There was. We were fortunate, very fortunate. 
And that FJ  Holden got us there. Grandpa used it for another twelve years and then bought another Holden. It was maroon and white and probably an EK model - although I can't be sure of that. It was the last car he bought
The heat on the day he came to get us was so intense that the dye from the red leather seats came out and stained his white shirt.  (Men like Grandpa never wore coloured shirts at that time.) I remember thinking there was blood on his back. My grandmother was not impressed - not that she blamed Grandpa.
Many years later I was at the local shopping centre and someone pulled up near where I had parked my trike. The car was a beautifully restored cream FJ Holden. The driver commented on my trike. I told him, "My grandfather had an FJ that colour."
He told me "I bought it from someone in ...... "  He went on to say that the only real problem with it had been the hand brake. There had been a little card on the dashboard saying "Don't forget the handbrake". It was Grandpa's old car! The new owner was, if anything, more excited by this than I was. We chatted a little more and then I pedalled off thinking of all the trips we children had made in that car.
Grandpa was not a good driver. He did not enjoy driving. He did it out of necessity. His absent mindedness over the handbrake was an indication that he preferred to concentrate on other things - but I think he missed the old FJ.