Despite the misdirect of that opening line and title, I want to talk about my old car.
My old car, an 11-year-old sedan, was tired. It traded in for a pathetic $1500, dwarfed by the evidently over $10,000 it would have cost to restore it to true roadworthiness. Among its many ailments, one of its headlights had water trapped in it, and one of the inner door panels--the rear driver's side door, of all options--had started to fully separate from the frame, making the door stick every time it was opened. If it was a smart car, it was smart in the sense that single-celled organisms are smart: no futuristic amenities like a back-up camera or blind spot sensors, instead the most it could muster was the damn voice commands to get my bluetooth to play that had an almost 100% failure rate (oh lord the horrific names I called that poor robot voice when she told me, "You can say USB" when BITCH I *DID* SAY USB).
But my old car, named Little Car, was a good car. He (because he was a boy, unlike my girl car before him) was a work horse. We put over 100,000 miles on him, which means he could have driven around the world over 4 times. He had good pick-up, and excellent maneuverability--he could do the tightest u-turns and squeeze into tiny parallel parking spots with just a bit of finesse. He kept me safe in multiple (thankfully minor) accidents and weathered countless mild to moderate repairs. His penchant for flat tires for a stretch while I lived in Massachusetts got me skilled up quickly in changing them, even in work clothes, even on work trips. I liked the little song he played to remind you to take the keys out of the ignition or buckle your seatbelt, and the anxiety with which he alerted you on the rare occasion his trunk was ever open while he was in motion.
The last few years of our time together, I'll admit I was always a bit ashamed of his state. He was perpetually coated in a layer of smoothie packet crust, pretzel stick shards, granola bar bits, desiccated french fries, dust, and hair (HOW so much hair??). The interior of his windshield was always accumulating an alarming film of unknown provenance that would at a minimum generally look crummy but at its worst seriously impact visibility when the sun was at just the right height in the sky, which was always when you were either driving to or from daycare with one or both children along for the ride. Random spots or splotches of food or drinks would remain, punctuating the upholstery, for a deeply undignified amount of time. All of this high level of baseline mess persisted because, with two very small children, truly who has the time, energy, and delusion to waste on the Sisyphean task of cleaning it up? And maybe it doesn't hurt to have a little daily humbling in your life, especially such a low-stakes humbling as a dirty car.
And yet, Little Car was a refuge. After getting over a normative amount of anxiety while learning to drive as a teenager, I have always loved driving (except in Boston). I love being in motion, I love being in my agency. I love being sequestered, contained, yet still out in the world. I love listening to what I choose. I love going exactly where I want to go. I love reflecting. I love dangling my hand out the window when the air outside is hot. During the pandemic, our only outlet was to drive, and we would flee north up a long, winding road into the county where houses got farther apart and the trees at times were dense and green, or through a state park to our southwest, or through a nearby historic smaller city. At least that way we could be out in the world without risk of getting sick. At least that way we didn't feel so trapped, and we could be reminded that the world was still big.
Over the decade he was my car, Little Car was an escape. I drove as far north as Ogunquit and as far south as Raleigh-Durham. I drove to Sylvan Beach, Long Beach, Cape Cod, tiny cabins, covered in cream cheese and bagels crumbs on my way postdoc, over bridges and onto ferries, back and forth from the city where I trained to the city in which I was destined to live to plan my wedding, then back again and again to the city where I trained after we moved away because I still loved it.
Little Car empowered us at major life turning points. He helped us move 3 times across 3 different states. He drove us on a 3-hour round trip to get our then-pathetic-and-meek little mutt, and now majestic, beautiful, good-most-of-the-time medium-sized mutt. He took the unnecessarily long way to the hospital the second time around, and he drove both our babies safely home from the hospital. He drove me to interviews and first days of work, to weddings and baby showers, and then always home.
When I got Little Car, almost exactly 11 years ago, I was nearing the end of my 20s and the end of graduate school. I was about to start my internship, which would require 3 hours of commuting by public transit every day. Having done that commute 3 days a week during my third year of grad school, I knew doing it 5 days a week with a 40+ hour work week while trying to finish my dissertation would break me. It was time and energy I simply did not have to spare.
Thankfully, my Mom and Stepdad came to visit, and spent one day of the weekend they were in town at a Ford dealership negotiating a lease for me. My Stepdad took advantage of the salesman stepping away for a moment to dip behind his desk to verify that they were, in fact, giving me a good deal. In the midst of these negotiations, I called my Dad to let him know how things were going and tell him the terms of the lease. I'd previously told him I'd be getting a car and why, and now that we had numbers, I asked if he might be able to help me with part of the cost of the down payment. I'd been living off tiny grad student stipends and student loans for the past 4 years and my internship stipend was on trend: not generous. Any little bit would help.
I don't remember what he said, but I remember that he was so relentless in berating me for asking that, sobbing in front of the dealership where I'd fled when it was clear the call would not go well, I simply begged him to say no. "Dad, you can just say no. Please, just say no." But something in him just needed to punish me for asking.
As we were trading in Little Car, with my kids' handprints still on the rear windows and the indentations of their carseats still pressed into the fabric of the seats, with the air of over a decade of conversations, singing, laughter, and also tears and silence still dissipating, I thought about the photo that was taken of me and Little Car when that lease was finalized. In it, I've draped myself along the top of the driver's side door with a huge, showy smile on my face, telegraphing jubilance at suddenly being a lady with a car, stuffing down the heartwrenching, sick, confused, bombed out feeling that still managed to catch me by surprise back then. I was really good--although definitely not perfect--at blotting out that feeling when it was called for.
I took that photo again as we said goodbye to Little Car. In some ways, it's the same photo: I made sure to pose exactly the same way, extending my arm along the curve of the front driver's side door as if I was slinging my arm around the shoulders of a friend and putting on a big smile. In some ways, it's different: for one, it was pouring rain, and I am visibly soaked. I'm also almost 40 now, and Little Car looks significantly less shiny and new. But also, the smile isn't fake. It's poignant, taking stock of how much this little car has seen and the end of its chapter, but it's sincere, and it's not covering up for anybody. By design, I just don't have cause to do much smile-faking anymore.
I know the car is just a thing. My mind keeps toying with seeing letting go of Little Car as if we're returning an old pet to the pound, but thankfully I have my wits about me enough to know that come on, it's not that. But of course even objects have a bit of a life of their own in part because they sometimes accompany us through so much, and because of the meaning with which we imbue them. Little Car was a talisman of so many things--independence, freedom, adulthood, excitement, adventure, efficacy, possibility, and love--but of course, like any complex thing, they weren't all good. Sometimes, moving on to a new chapter, even if you're not completely sure you're ready to let go of the old one, is the strongest, bravest, healthiest, and most hopeful thing you can do.
{Heart}
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