You make me want to be a better driver

Here’s my newest, bluest life partner and the albatross ’round my neck.

So far, I’m pleased with the Honda and how it has sailed me smoothly to work and back home again.

But a new car is also a burdensome reminder of money spent before it’s earned and of how things haven’t quite shaped up the way you hoped they might.

For too long, I’ve been a single and self-sufficient bike-and-bus-taking do less harmer, occasionally driving a beater as a mea culpa for driving at all. Now I spend about two hours loping around in a car every day, clinging to my travel mug and pulling my hair.  All fender bending, no sparkling pioneer spirit. But it has to do for now.

The Honda is by far the nicest, classiest car I’ve ever had and so I’m cycling through all of those typical new relationship feelings. I love the way it smells and I want to mess around with all the buttons and take it out on the highway and roll down the windows.

Such is love in the springtime.

It’s nerve-wracking, though, starting out before that first scratch or door ding. Facing a car that’s never left you stranded on the highway or told you in anger that its last owner was a better driver… but knowing it probably will.

And Lord knows,  I’ve been hurt before. There was the Buick Century that gave me a black eye when I wrecked it dramatically at age 17. And the Taurus– he always disappointed me and still I stayed, because I wasn’t convinced that I could do any better.

The Porsche, of course, remains flashy, unpractical and high-maintenance. The “roommate’s hot older brother in a band” car who forgets your name while he’s kissing you, but always wanders back into your mind after a couple of beers when it’s warm out and a particular song is playing.

I’m guilty of overlooking pragmatism and reliability in favor of a confidant swagger or hot paint-job. But as much as I don’t want to admit it, maybe I am the kind of girl who really could use a nice car for a change.

I can’t promise I’ll always be a good driver or that I’ll never leave an empty Diet Coke bottle in the back seat, but I think the Honda and I are going to get along just fine. Or that’s how it seems at first blush.

And now, a good ol’ silly song about findin’ a “new” man… or car, as it were.

“Girl, that’s so not cool in so many ways
These were supposed to be my carefree single days
Instead I’m punching walls and coming up with ways
Ways to win you back from your new man”

-Mason Jennings

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 9th, 2010 at 4:53 pm and is filed under wealth, wisdom. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.