Car Trading Memories

Early last month, we finally traded our 2004 Toyota Sienna van for a 2010 Toyota Matrix hatchback. The Sienna ran very well but was looking worse for wear. It had a minor dent from an unknown person who backed into it. A year ago, I was stopped at the yield sign of an exit ramp in Pennsylvania, waiting for traffic to pass, and a fellow (also waiting the traffic, and distracted because he was late picking up his kid) bumped into me from behind. He was only going 5 or 10 mph but it was enough to crumple a bit of the rear fender.

We didn't need a minivan anymore, now that my daughter is in college. But the van was so handy when she was in high school! We could haul her skis in winter, band stuff in most seasons, and cart her and her friends around to various functions. What a suburban life! The van was also quite useful in moving her stuff to college and then back for summer break.

One of the fun anecdotes associated with the van was prior to our actually driving it. We had purchased it from a dealership in Kent, OH but had to wait until it arrived from the factory. We were vacationing in the West and strolling around the Mt. Rushmore park when we got the call that the van had arrived.

I’ve stayed home with Emily every summer since the one before kindergarten. It was a handy and enjoyable way to manage her activities until she learned to drive and to spend time with her. Naturally, a lot of “van memories” involve her summer camps and classes, and not only that, but getting her to and from school. The school bus drivers were poor along our route, in my opinion, and her high school was only about three miles away.

Rereading John Updike's essay "My Life in Cars"[1] made me wonder how much of my life was spent in the van.  While getting that doggone song from "Rent" stuck in my head--"Seasons of Love" and its famous opening, "525,600 minutes"---I made some calculations. A half-hour every day is a reasonable minimum estimate, given our distance from various things like jobs, church, and shopping. That estimate gives me (if I’m thinking and calculating correctly) 53 total days, over a seven year period, spent driving the van. But that's a minimum: I also drove a few times to visit my mother in Illinois--a 20-hour round trip--on trips to visit Ms. Daughter in college--at first a 6-hour round trip, and then after we moved it was a 28-hour round trip---and various other excursions.

So, a modest estimate is that I spent perhaps four full months, possibly five (out of a seven year period) driving the van. In contrast: in seven years, I also spent about 2-1/3 years asleep. Fortunately, none of those times were spent in the van!!

These thoughts can be read in conjunction with an earlier blog post on northeastern Ohio: http://paulstroble.blogspot.com/2010/10/northeast-ohio.html  Although we owned the van for two years in Missouri, I'll probably always think of it as our Ohio car, a faithful and nicely low-maintenance vehicle that kept us safe and on time through many routines and adventures. 

Notes:

1.  John Updike, "My Life in Cars," Due Considerations: Essays and Criticism (New York: Ballantine Books, 2007), 86-91.