Death of a Colt...?

Based on a True Story
Written By: Tyler Keyes

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away….

The Chrysler Corporation sat around a round table, much like that of King Arthur and his Knights, discussing what their next car design would be. They discussed how they wanted it to be aerodynamic like a bullet, yet as funny looking as a squished jelly bean. They wanted it to be small and compact, yet even smaller and compacter than anything ever built. They wanted the driver to feel like an idiot every time he walked out to put the key in his car with the pink decals on the side, yet keep on doing it year after year because of its amazing fuel efficiency (42 mpg last tank). They wanted the name to strike fear into the hearts of every soul who heard it, yet at the same time, make them fall madly in love with it. They wanted the passengers to feel special by putting the controls to turn on the Air Conditioning when it was 105 degrees in Las Vegas, yet teach them to never get their hopes up too high by never actually installing an Air Conditioning unit in the vehicle. Yes, their brain storming at this meeting was actually so intense; it is rumored to have been the root cause of Hurricane Andrew. Finally the meeting was over, its participants dead in exhaustion, hunger and brain power, left to their respective dwellings knowing they had created the finest creation man had made since Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David created “Seinfeld”. A few months later their creation was made public, and thus THE 1991 PLYMOUTH COLT was born.

Little did these genius car manufactures know at the time, 4 years earlier, Mike and Cathy Keyes had created their own monster.

A monster that would grow to become the better half to the colt’s life, a perfect fit. The 1991 Plymouth Colt sold like hot cakes that had been made a couple of months earlier and now had bits and pieces of mold growing on them and weren’t so hot anymore. The Colt’s first owner was pleased with her new car. She drove it happily for a while, whilst putting it through some of its most difficult tests. She went to get the oil changed, and drove it into the pit, and then while taking a vacation down to St. George, UT some 5 hours away,

this ignorant woman while driving down the freeway at 75 mph, was not aware that the Colt was born with a 5th gear and drove it some 300 miles in 4th gear with the rpm’s somewhere around 9,000 (its difficult to say exactly because those same genius designers at Chrysler neglected to put a tachometer in it). But nevertheless, the Colt lived on, the colt lived on to find its next owner and to its bitter shame, it was an ignorant 16 year old girl driver again. She treated it well for a couple of hours, until she backed it over a couple (4) giant rocks. While hearing the horrendous “ERREKERRKSKDEATHKKERR!” coming from underneath the car she thought, “Well, I’m already half-way over, I might as well just continue on” and she finished the gut wrenching process over the other half of the vehicle. While now having the hold the steering wheel at an approx. 55 degrees to the left, the Colt could still drive straight down the road. But the colt preserved, she preserved until that utterly disastrous morning when that girl, now 17 spun out of control on a sheet of ice while driving down the highway, did a 540 into oncoming traffic and was hit by a much larger vehicle (which if you read previously, actually isn’t all that difficult if you take into account that the colt was designed to be smaller and compacter than anything ever previously designed) and totaled the colt. It lay there, in shambles, fatally wounded waiting for the icy hand of death to put its ugly grasp on its shoulders. However, thanks to the generosity of the insurance policy, its owners didn’t give up hope. The towed it, hit it, smashed it, and eventually fixed it. The colt lived to die another day.
Its owner soon wished to move on to bigger and less compactier stuff and chose to sell the vehicle to her younger brother. (yes folks, that is not a typo, she wanted to sell her car to her poorer, younger, and dashingly handsome brother) After the price was negotiated the 15 ½ year old Tyler Keyes placed his hands on the wheel and started it up, never before had the Colt felt such power, such freedom, such love. While feeling the burning hatred deep down inside his heart every time he would have to walk from the high school to his small little “girl” car with the pink decals on the side, the colt knew she was loved. After a brief depressing 2 year wait, the colt was happy to be driven again by the hands who loved her. She didn’t even mind when the very first thing he did when he came home was go to ksl.com and start looking for new cars, because she knew he’d be back. He did come back, mostly because he realized he didn’t have any money, but he came back nevertheless. He then embraced the colt like one embraces a giant pimple on the tip of your nose, you hate it but you don’t really have any other choice but to just deal with it. He started taking it on trips with him, to and from Cedar City countless times, to St. George (this time in 5th gear) and even all the way to Las Vegas.
The colt was alive for the first time in her life; she could drive anywhere and be anything. Until that one fateful day of June 27, 2010, just short of her 20th birthday, the colt could push on no longer. Perhaps it was because of the lack of love it felt from the driver, or the fact that it was scared stiff being driven by yet another girl and didn’t want to be driven into a pit, in 4th gear for 300 miles, over giant rocks, or totaled again, but the colt died. It was towed by Doctor Salas to his operating room, where she has sat ever since. They put gas in her, changed the oil, changed the fuel pump, kicked it and loved it, yet dead she remains. However, the brave doctor continues on with a will and a desire unmatched by any other to find the cure. He feels that the prognosis is the distributer and ordered the part in. After a long wait the part comes, yet it is the wrong part. We order another part to replace it, get it and are pleased to find it is correct! We take it, go to install it and find out that yet again, those short sided retailers have sold us the wrong part. The brave Doctor thinks that we can attempt a risky “guts” transplant by taking the guts of the new part and putting them into the old casing, only to discover from further research that you can’t put a kidney where a heart is meant to be. So we wait again to find out what the prognosis shall be. It was quite the cruel irony to hear the song that says, “don’t it always seem to go, that you don’t know what you got, ‘till it’s gone.” while working on the car. The colt is trying its best to stay alive, and the brave doctor and his nurses are doing their best to keep the life support machines running. Its family anxiously awaits in the waiting room listening, praying, and hoping that the doctor does not come out saying, “Prognosis….Negative.”



For More information about "Prognosis: Negative"
Please see "Seinfeld" Season 3 Episode 4