The Miata Sport is a rear-wheel-drive sports car with a small 2-liter, inline 4-cylinder engine that makes 167 horsepower.

Spangenberg Photography

Sometimes, you have to escape — or at least give it a darned good try.

I flipped the latch anchoring the hardtop, power retractable roof of the 2009 Mazda MX-5 Miata Sport roadster. I pushed a button. The roof rose and slid backwards, exposing me and the Miata Sport’s cabin to the full glory of a young spring day.

I was going nowhere in particular, which is the kind of driving you do in tiny, two-seat roadsters. Their only excuse for being, when you get down to it, is driving for the sake of driving — the kind of driving some people might find wasteful in these hard times, but the kind of motorized tonic that is necessary to quench the souls of people who believe that somewhere, somehow, even in all of this economic mess, there remains something akin to the romance of the road.

I found it on a stretch through Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley, on one of those roads with two opposing lanes winding past farms that seemed to show some signs of economic, or, at least, culinary viability.

The Miata Sport, a rear-wheel drive in the long tradition of sports cars, has a small 2-liter, inline 4-cylinder engine. But it makes 167 horsepower, quite decent oomph for a car weighing 2,562 pounds.

The fun-to-drive part — the control-freak aspect — comes in the six-speed manual gearbox. You really have to work it in rhythm with the clutch, especially on dip-and-curve rural roads, to keep the Miata Sport going without stalling or sputtering. It becomes a self-involved contest that is also liberating.

Noise is a factor, as it is in most roadsters. And that’s noise top-up or top-down. The small engine emits a bee buzz, especially at higher revolutions. And that retractable hardtop, albeit beautifully designed and engineered, has a tympanic quality when raised and when the Miata Sport is rolling over rough roads.

When the Miata was introduced in 1989, it was marketed as the roadster with a smile — a happy-faced car that critics and supporters alike said appealed more to women than to men.

Now, Mazda’s designers have given the little car a grille of wider mouth. It is a more aggressive face that looks masculine but also a bit silly. It doesn’t matter. The fun-to-drive factor remains, and it is enhanced by the styling, engineering and ease of operation of the convertible hardtop.

Throughout the car’s history, people have complained that the Miata is not one of the fastest or most powerful sports cars on the road. They are right. It was never meant to be, although there are legions of Miata owners, those devotees of weekend Miata track racing, who beg to differ.

But both arguments miss the point.

The car is a joy machine, an escape pod. It is a roadster meant for control freaks, with one passenger optional. It is, on occasion, the perfect car for all of us.

2009 Mazda MX-5 Miata Sport

Complaints: The Miata Sport can be a bit of a buzz machine at highway speeds. Also, for a small car, especially a small car with a six-speed manual transmission, its fuel-efficiency is less than impressive.

Ride, acceleration and handling: It gets good marks in all three categories. The car is fun to drive.

Head-turning quotient: It’s still cute. It draws smiles in a world of frowns.

Body style/layout: The MX-5 Miata is a front-engine, rear-wheel-drive roadster available with a manually operated soft top or a power retractable hard top. There are 12 iterations of the car, too many to delineate here.

Capacities: There are seats for two people. Luggage capacity is minimal. The fuel tank holds 12.7 gallons of recommended “for best performance” premium unleaded gasoline.

Mileage: I averaged 26 miles per gallon in highway driving. It seems to me that a car this small should deliver better mileage than that.

Pricing: The base price on the 2009 Mazda Miata MX5 Sport roadster is $25,390. Dealer’s invoice price on that model is $23,461. Price as tested is $26,060, including a $670 transportation charge. Dealer’s price as tested is $24,131. Prices are sourced from Mazda, Edmunds.com, and Cars.com.

Purse-strings notes: A fun ride. Compare with the Pontiac Solstice and Saturn Sky.