My Sweet Ride

While all my friends were getting cool cars like Volkswagen Rabbits or Monte Carlos.  The car that I was fortunate to have been handed down to me when I was a vulnerable 16 year old was an extremely large 1978 Chevrolet station wagon. 

This is what she looked like brand new!

 I remember the day my dad bought the car home from the local car dealership as a surprise for my mom.  It was almost brand new and was the most obnoxious solid maroon color. My dad was pleased as punch with it because he loved red vehicles but my mom liked to be unobtrusive and a solid maroon five door station wagon screams attention. 

I had three other siblings and I was next to the youngest so my assigned seat was the rear-facing seat in the far back.  Not a fun place to be especially when you are waiting at a stop light and another car pulls up behind you.  Talk about an awkward moment.  What do you do?  Look them in the eye, turn away, pretending not to notice them or make faces at them.  

When I was lucky enough to inherit this beauty she had cancer spots over her entire body which added to her eye appeal.  Driving it to school, I felt anything but cool.  I tried to find the farthest parking spot away from the school.  Hoping that no one would notice that I was the one driving the ginormous red bus.  It was hard not to notice.  My friend Christy would roll in with her Jeep Wrangler wheeling into a spot with ease while I had to do a three point turn just to attempt to fit in a parking space.  

Since, I was lucky enough to have a car given to me I also inherited the responsibility of driving my absent minded brother to school every day.  One day on my way into school we got about a quarter mile down the road and my brother announced that he forgot his book and had to have it.  Furious, I forgot for a moment what I was driving and decided to make a U turn in the middle of the road.  Let's just say she didn't turn on a a dime.  Ending up in the ditch stuck as we sat reclined in our seats because our front end pointed straight up with the wheels just touching the black top I firmly told my brother it was ALL his fault.  

The only time I was proud of my beauty was on my way home from work in a blazing snow storm. She plowed through the two foot snow drifts like it was a cruise ship sailing on the sea.  I believe I passed two or three small cars abandoned on the side of the road because they just didn't have the pushing power that my girl had.  

I was so sad the day she began to burn a lot of oil and began to overheat.  This was the only time I was so excited to be stranded on the side of the road.  It was pure elated joy when my dad gave me the news that the motor was shot! She went to junkyard heaven and I didn't even

cry over her.