I am in automotive limbo these days. My little baby, my four-wheeled chariot of freedom, is not well. In fact, it is sitting somewhere outside the mechanic's garage, waiting patiently for its turn.There are few more depressing sights for a driver than seeing his car on the back of a tow truck.
And yet, that is the image stuck in my mind all this past weekend. Following the tow truck, the car looked fine, but all the way to the shop, my mind raced with thoughts of complicated, exotic repairs and a repair bill to rival a couple of trips to the gas station.
In the meantime, as I wait helplessly for word on the status of my car, I am not without transportation.
My parents have generously loaned me one of their cars and while it sure beats having to pay for a rental, there is something unsettling about driving someone else's car. Especially when that someone else is your mother.
I find myself driving slower in her car and I am not sure it is because I am just being more careful with it or it is because it is the car of a senior citizen. This is not to say that all seniors habitually drive at least 10 miles per hour under the speed limit, but my friend and alter ego, the Green Arrow, tells me there is an inverse ratio between the age of the driver and the speed of the automobile.
I also seem to dawdle at green lights a little bit more. Either I am still unsure of the power of this six-cylinder monster or it just doesn't respond well to a lead foot.
Whatever the reason, it is a strange experience.
When I first joined the ranks of licensed drivers, I was eager to drive any vehicle that someone was foolish enough to hand over their keys. I recall learning how to drive a standard transmission with the aid of some high-school friends who had a van with "three on the tree" shifting. In hindsight, learning the intricacies of driving a stick-shift car was hard enough; learning how to maneuver a full-sized van at the same time was just short of lunatic.
But back then, I lived to drive.
Grandma needs to go to the market? Give me the keys, I'm your man.
Little sister needs a ride to softball practice? I'll take her and even fill up the tank on my way home.
I was the most helpful, conscientious and well-mannered teenager -- as long as it involved some solo time behind the wheel.
After nearly 30 years with my license, the thrill of driving has waned, beaten down my traffic jams, toll booths and out-of-control drivers.
And now that I am saddled with someone else's conveyance, my zeal to drive has reached its lowest ebb.
Everything is strange to me when I am strapped in the cockpit of my mother's car. The gauges aren't in the right place and I have become so used to driving with a standard transmission that in my mom's automatic, I find myself constantly searching with the left foot for the clutch pedal. I already have spilled my soda twice thinking it was the shift stick.
I suppose that, on the grand list of problems, having a car in the shop is far from the top. And since I am getting a loaner car for free, I have little room to complain.
And yet I am uneasy.
I never realized how much I took for granted my car starting up whenever I needed it. Now that it isn't sitting on my driveway, however, I feel constrained, constricted and uncomfortable in this state of suspended transportation.
But I have a glimmer of hope that the repair won't be too complicated or too costly. And soon I will have my little baby back, free to roam the highways and byways with all the gauges in the right place and something for my left foot to do.
Maybe I will even recapture some of that early passion for driving I had when I was 16.
I might just even volunteer to run some errands for my wife -- just because I can.
aaron.london@news-jrnl.com
