Day 62 - Clunker

 Clunker 

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

I never wanted the mini-van. It was a piece of junk when I got it; my two older siblings had already driven it into the ground – fender-benders, broken tail lights, dents on the doors and bumpers, the radio only worked if you hit it in the proper way, the driver’s side window didn’t go up or down.

The car was already old when my father bought it. My father made sure of that. He wasn’t going to waste good money on a car that his children would invariably treat poorly and had a high chance of wrecking. It kept the insurance low and it also made sure none of us had anything cool enough to impress a date or fast enough to drive dangerously. We all proved him wrong when it came to speeding, and that proved to certainly be dangerous enough.

My siblings took turns driving it during their high school experiences. They were teenagers who drove aggressively and didn’t check any of the fluid levels. Not that I would be any different, mind you. I’m just pointing out the fact that the years had not been kind and the miles were hard miles. When I got to high school, my sister was already in college and my brother had no interest in chauffeuring me to or from school. That was fine, I preferred to catch a ride with friends. But when I turned sixteen during sophomore year, my brother had already left for college, so that meant the mini-van was mine.

The thing is, it never really mattered if the vehicle was cool or not. Friends might make fun of it, but they were going to make fun of anything. No one was driving a sports car. Everybody had some used piece of shit junker and teenage boys are just assholes no matter what. A car was a car. You could pile people in and break the law by crowding too many people in the back and a bunch of rowdy teens looking for trouble would enjoy the ride no matter whose car it was.

I dated many girls in that car. I sat in the back and made out with a girl named Abbey, not because I was particularly into her, but because it seemed like the thing to do when you owned a van. Not a cool can like from the summer of love or anything, but this was about as good as it was going to get.

I remember sitting on the roof and getting high with my friend Mitch. We would sing along to the radio while sitting in the parking lot at Berkshire Park. We were also dumb enough to not think about the extra weight we were putting on the windshield as we climbed up or down. It was no surprise when one of us stepped too hard and cracked it down the middle.

The front window broke further and used to slip down while I was driving. I tried tape, I tried glue, but eventually when nothing held it on track, I would push one hand against it while driving. It was a particular challenge in the rain. When winter arrived, I tried to cover it in plastic. That worked about as well as you’d imagine.

I took that van to Lake Michigan Junior year and to New Orleans senior year.

When some of us coached flag football for one of the senior sororities, we hauled equipment. We also kidnapped recruits and hauled them through a night of hazing that mostly involved covering them in various foods and sauces.

I drove that thing to my first day of college and on my graduation day.

I never wanted that car. It was supposed to last me maybe two years. No one expected me to milk six out of it. It was ready for the junk yard the first day I drove it. All I ever did was help speed up the process.

I never loved that car, that is, not until the day I saw them hauling it away.