Ode to a Car

There are few things I've had in my life (not counting people) for over a decade. That is to say, few things that I've used, for the most part, on a daily basis. And while I don't consider myself a material person, it was clear to me that as the tow truck drove away with my 1995 Ford Taurus that this particular material possession was far more than just a vehicle to me. It was a companion, a friend, for eleven years.

I didn't immediately like the car when it was presented to me in May of 2000. Still upset at the death of my last car, I was being forced to make a quick decision. I was in college and working, and I couldn't go without a car for too long. What made the process easier was that my mom was also buying a car the same weekend as me. Hers was failing and ironically, we both ended up with Fords (hers technically a Mercury, I believe). We purchased our cars from a family friend who was a car dealer. A very nice man named Mike Larkin who had put me in my previous car too, and also tried to teach me how to drive a stick. He had a daughter who went to UWEC like I did, and asked me if I was paying all my parking tickets. UWEC is notorious for it's terrible parking and giving out parking tickets like candy on Halloween. I will always remember that day because while generally the relationship between a car salesman and the buyer is a tenuous one, I liked Mike and I trusted that he would get me into a safe and reliable car. He promised my mother and grandfather so. And he did. Though at the time, I wished we could have had the extra luck to get a color I liked.

My Taurus was silver, and I later called it The Silver Bullet, since I was prone to naming my cars at the time. My first car, a Plymouth Sundance, was a tiny little thing that I ironically called The Great White Shark. That car died the weekend of my high school graduation, which was yet another irony. Out with the old and in with the new, I suppose. Next came my Mercury Sable, a dark green sedan which for the life of me, I can now not remember the name of. No doubt I called it something corny like "The Green Machine."

But none of these lasted a significant fraction of the time that my last car did. I had my Taurus for my first date with Andrew, my wedding, our drive across the country and back again, my entire stint as a Navy dependent to an active-duty sailor. For a while, it was our family car - if a family can be just two people - while Andrew went through his other cars. And boy, did he know how to take care of a car. My Ford wouldn't have lasted half as long as it did without him. A few years back the Taurus was starting to show it's age by having a few transmission problems. It shook, jolted and made plenty of noise. A couple years ago, the muffler started to fail, and while we could have gotten it fixed, we knew that without fixing the transmission (which would cost more than the car was worth), fixing the muffler - or really any major problems - wouldn't be worth it.  So, we watched our car fail, and I begged it silently every time I drove it to hang on a bit longer. The situation wasn't that drastic...It drove well enough; it just seemed to make a fuss about it. But I knew it was only a matter of time before we'd have to say goodbye.

Andrew and I knew we couldn't sell the car for a lot of money, nor would we really want to. No teenager could buy the car and drive it safely without putting a lot of money into it, and in which case, what was the point of buying a cheap car? So we decided to donate. Andrew wanted to go local, and I wanted to go military, so when we heard about Minnesota Vietnam Veteran's Charity, we decided to go through there. Personally, I'd rather have found a place that covered all vets and not just the ones from Vietnam, but considering how many people were affected, I couldn't deny that they would reach a lot of people.

I won't go into the process or legalities of donating a car, but if you need information yourself, feel free to ask me. I now know the tax forms, the paperwork to read, etc. that is required for this sort of thing.

I cleaned out the car a few days ago, and Andrew took out my nice speakers yesterday, saying he'd find them a new home. My car was loaded with memories, and quite honestly, a little bit of trash. Some things manage to quite literally slip through the cracks, and I found a receipt from Norfolk in 2003. $1.45/gal for gas. If I could time travel, I'd go back and buy gas. ;-)  As I noted on Facebook, I also found a 2006 Connecticut Renaissance Festival program guide (my favorite ren fest), old candy, a Kerry/Edwards bumper sticker, and a bunch of travel maps and brochures, as well as an earring, coins, and a mini plastic cell phone that looks like it was meant for a Barbie.

Cleaning, removing speakers, and sorting the items didn't give me the finality of what the Vietnam Vets' tow truck did. Andrew noticed I was crying, so I left him, not wanting to deal with his mocking jests. He probably wouldn't have been that bad, but I hate being witnessed crying, especially when it seemed so silly. Though I knew it wasn't silly. Our Taurus was a good car, and it would be missed, and rightfully so. That car listened to me sing at outrageous volumes, let me sit on it to watch the stars, and once I think I even tried to have sex in it, which is probably the most uncomfortable thing in the world. It's held friends, family, wayward teens, boxes, liquids, leftovers...

My car had a soul and it was very good to me. I will miss it, and I hope that some lucky vet somewhere can fix it up and make good use of it.