From Rags to Riches

Can you get sentimental over a car?  Excuse me for a moment while I do just that.  Last week Dan was contemplating that maybe it was time for us to move on.  Our little white Honda Civic had served us well and  it was time for Dan to get a new ride.  We bought "The Civic" as semi-newlyweds in 2001 from a teeny little car dealership in Manassas, Virginia.  It was no frills car for me to take the train and back while Dan drove his company car.  The little lady was already 3 years old and had 50,000 miles on it.  For a Honda it was barely broken in.  Here we are 10 years and 125,000 (!) miles later.  We got out of her what we paid. Ya think?

A funny story about this little car:
When we lived in Virginia, I would commute on the VRE into Washington D.C. One night I had to work late so I missed all the trains going back into Virginia.  Not too big of a deal because Dan was able to meet me at the closest Metro station (about 20 min from home) and took me home from there.  We left The Civic in the parking lot of the train station.  Dan brought me to the train in the morning so I could take the car home at night.

After a long day's work, I hopped off the train and walked toward the car. I noticed that all the windows were fogged up except for my driver's side window.  Hmm, interesting, I thought. When I walked up to the car, I saw that the window wasn't fogged up because there wasn't a window there!  My car had been broken into!! The "thieves" had duct taped a big "X" across the window (to minimize the shatter) and threw a rock through the window.

Remember above I said it was a no-frills car? When I say no frills, I mean no frills.  No power anything, except for the steering, AC, and an AM/FM radio.  Yep, not fancy.  I am sure whoever broke into our car was very disappointed as now the most valuable thing in the car was the rock they used to break the window.

The funny part is, they didn't look in the trunk.  Because we lived in a rinky-dinky apartment at the time, we didn't have a lot of storage so we used the trunk of the car.  If they would have taken the time to open the trunk they would have found a 6 month supply of toilet paper and paper towels!

This little car has been good to us.  She became Dan's car when he changed jobs and no longer had a company car.  I had to get a bigger car to start hauling kids around.  Still the little Civic held on.  She would purr at you when you were at a stop sign and had a little shake when you went above 75 mph.  She hummed along just nicely when we moved from Virginia to Kansas.  She carried my man home every night...I would call Dan "My Knight in the White Civic."

But, all good things come to an end.  She didn't fit the kids very well when Dan would bring them in the morning for carpool.  Plus, 175,000 miles means she would have to have some major surgery in the upcoming years to keep her up her youthful energy. It was time for her to go to a new family.

On Wednesday at noon, I finally got around to listing her on Cr@ig's List.  By 10:30 p.m. that same night Dan had cash in hand!  She was going home with a 16 year old looking for his first car.  Dan gave her a little pat on the trunk and said to the young man, "be good to her."

Now Dan's got a new ride.  He went from no-frills to a "new to us" 2008 Honda Accord EX-L with more doodads than he knows what to do with. Rags to riches so to speak.

Here's to another 125,000 miles and 10 years!  Maybe the next driver of this car will be a certain 16 year girl looking for her first car. (EEE!!!) Never mind, she will be driving an armored tank.