Farewell, Blue Baby
Last weekend we traded in my long-time roadway companion, my Jetta, my friend...
It was certainly time—she had more than her fair share of little idiosyncrasies—but even though I was very excited about the new car we were getting, letting go of my very first car was a little emotional. After all, we'd spent ten years together. Blue Baby (whose highly original name came from a doll I had as a child) was my dream car at 17 young years of age. Literally. There was no other car under the sun that I would have rather called my own than this navy blue diesel dreamboat.
Gift with Purchase
Strange happenstance allowed my family, who was not one to purchase brand new cars, to acquire the Jetta in May of 2003. At the time, I had been sharing a Mazda 626 with my mom (on a good day) or driving the old family MPV minivan (on a very bad, soccer-momish day). I don't really remember what instigated the search for a car for me, but I can clearly recall going to the dealership with my dad. He decided that "car buying" was an important part of my driver's education (along with the feel of veering off the highway or slamming on my breaks going 60 - but that's another story...), so off we went to kick some tires.
I'd researched a few small sedans at the time, and we skimmed through the used lot at Garlyn Shelton in Bryan, Texas, when my dad starting asking a lot of questions about one particular car in the VW section. He must have known how I was drawn to Volkswagons, how cute and perky and "me" the Jetta felt to my teenage self. "Let's just take a look," he said. Then, somewhere after the safety features and the promising mileage of diesel cars, it was, "Let's just take a test drive." And before I knew it, papers were signed, and I was taking a very, VERY nervous left turn out of the dealership and onto Highway 6. I could have cried. In no way did I deserve such a lovely, perfect car, and yet here I was, driving it home.
Onward and Upward
Ten years in anyone's life is sure to bring a trove of memories, but these specific ten years with Blue Baby involved many of the major paradigm shifts I'm likely to experience. She took me to prom and graduation, drove me off to college, and kept me company as I memorized the tangled web of freeways that is LA. A safe place to belt out bad chick-music, my Jetta provided solace on a lonely night or after a bad date. We went to jobs and job interviews, to church and out with friends. Then, one remarkable Fall, she drove my boyfriend, Phil, and I to Colorado for a nervous first Thanksgiving with his parents. And back again the next year...as newlyweds. We loaded her trunk with wedding flowers and tested her shocks with an apartment's worth of Ikea boxes. On vacations and late-night Craigslist runs, we filled this car with laughter and deep discussions. And when we left the hospital with our first child, my Jetta safely carried our new family of three. Carefully, and slowly, home.
The Great Purge
The process of cleaning out ten years worth of your life unveils some pretty strange things: a mouth guard, a tube of has-to-be-expired-by-now chapstick, a bottle of hand sanitizer that expanded to near explosion in the heat, a set of Korean Language CDs, a Crossair barf bag, some twine, 85 cents, two half-spent packs of Kleenex, a 2005 Rand McNally road atlas, a hazardously damaged set of jumper cables, 14 re-useable grocery bags, two business cards for PrincessParty.com, the NIV Bible on CD, probably at least 50 other miscellaneous CDs, and a CD sermon series called "The New Eve" that I am at least six years late returning to one, Chrissie Wanke.
And though not quite as humorous, ten years of auto paperwork reveals some serious skeletons. Tires and batteries, hoses, belts, filters, fluids, and paint jobs galore. Like a Brentwood mom, few of her parts were original by the end. Did I really have collision repair six times between 2006 and 2009? I have been side swiped and rear-ended my fair share, once nearly totaled by a very repentant 18-year-old in a beamer.
Final Thoughts
Still, I had a hard time thinking of the Jetta as "old" - even though I had to be careful not to cut myself on the cracked gear shifter, and I couldn't unlock the back left door without reaching through the driver's side door...or turn the AC below 2 because it would start whistling. There was also the paint cracking on the rear-view mirror, the bent back antenna, and two missing emblems on hopelessly scratched hubcaps. A dash of mascara accented the ceiling next to the sunroof that occasionally opened on its own whim, and at least two solid pockmarks from who-knows-what had left their imprint on her side panels.
But, in my mind, she was as lovely as the day we drove her off the lot. And I think, in my memory, she always will be.
A final photo with my Jetta before we handed her over to VW Santa Monica. You can see our new car, Cinder, off to the left in the background.