Sticky shifting (high friction to slide shift console lever)

92 Subaru Legacy AWD Automatic, console shifter

When the car has sit for a week or longer, the shift lever is hard to move back and forth. This is a straight-line shifter (no moving around side indents, just straight forward and backward by pressing in on a release button on the shifter handle). It feels like there is a lot of friction in moving the shift lever. It goes away if I hold in the button and move the shift lever back and forth a dozen times.

I've been told that there is a cable that runs from the shift lever to the tranny (rather than a rod linkage). If that is true then maybe it has gotten rusty, similar to a bicycle brake cable, and I could lube it. If there is a cable, from which direction should I get at it? From above by removing the console? It's been a long time since I had the console removed but recall that the shift assembly bolted to the floor so I couldn't see underneath. Should I jack it up onto stands and get at it from underneath?

Lubing the cable by pointing the spray tube into the cable sheath could work but often I've found (on bicycles) that you don't get the entire cable and sheath lubed up unless you take it apart to get the cable out of the sheath. So how difficult would it be to replace the cable? Any special tools needed to replace the cable?

probably have to seal off the tube and fill up the cable from the bottom, and then let it drain. Often have to come up with techniques to solve a problem. I had a stick that Creeped after having a clutch replaced. Figured there was grease or dirt on the splined clutch shaft, so opened the rubber booted inspection cover around the pedal linkage, and sprayed some carb cleaner in, and fixed it.

Lost oil pressure on a car that I knew the motor had a lot of sludge, so before replacing the oil pump that was a hassle, having to remove the crossmember to get the pan off, I decided to try checking the oil pump pickup screen for restriction. The inverted cup the screen was on was visable through the oil drain hole, so drilled a hole through the side of the cup, and started pumping in crankase flush to try to back flush the screen. The flush came through very slowly but the more I pumped in, the faster it came out till it was coming out as fast as in. Buttoned it up, filled it with oil, and drove it for a few more years.