I politely replied (trying to save myself from ostracism on the playground) that in excluding minivans, I only meant to encourage suggestions beyond known options. I added, to cover my tracks, that I lived in a neighborhood with tight parking and so sought a vehicle with smaller profile.
Lies. Or maybe truthiness rather than truth. Yes, I knew the minivan option. Yes, I wanted a smaller profile, but not to fit in a parking spot. I wanted a smaller profile because, let's face it, we are what we drive. The smaller profile I seek is my own.
My sister and mother have been driving minivans much longer than I, and if they are what they drive, then let's pause to examine how they have pulled it off. My sister succeeds in making her van the coolest rig on the road. Hers are grey. She looks good behind that wheel: Driving with her shades on and her sporty bangs and her laser-focus. She has little sporty magnets to the back. Her family just owns it ~ make it feel like a transport unit for a hot rod race car or something.
My mother has her own approach. She positions rubber duckies in her window and keeps a Persian rug in the backseat for her Havanese dog. Mom keeps an ample food supply, survival gear for every emergency, her gardening stuff, and a scattering of garden soil throughout. It is home on wheels.
Me? I've never owned it. I haven't wanted to own it. I haven't wanted Jordy to own it. (I will go on the record saying I don't find men driving minivans to be sexy, except of course the sports god nephews my two sisters have spawned.) I've wanted to hold my nose and get it over with.
This morning, driving the three boys to the bus stop in our bulbous navy blue minivan, Duncan remarked how people look like their cars. "Interesting," I said, trying to mask my terror with false casualness. "Kind of like they look like their dogs... So... Do I look like the van?"
To my relief, all three exclaimed, "No!" Then Duncan added, "But you do look like the Audi." Phew! My ego sighed.
But I had to admit, I felt guilty. As if I had betrayed a loyal old friend, even as she labored to make my life work, to get the kids to school, to haul our crap and deliver us from disaster... "Poor Marge," I said.
You see, Marge was only recently Christened, and her name was picked after a major middle-age fix-up job. The poor thing was just beaten to a pulp by our lifestyle. Her back was sheared by a garage door carelessly closed on her; the back right bumper doesn't attach quite right. Long ago, her sunroof stopped working, and we just left it. The sliding doors were prone to snapped cables, making the boys scamper over each other awkwardly to get in and out. Arguably a safety hazard as well as annoying. We jokingly told the kids to "fasten their seatbelts and prepare for take-off" for many months during which a squealing metal-on-metal sound gave the impression of a jetplane winding up for ascension, a sound that appeared the day her hood got clobbered by a massive ice block that flew off a UPS truck, nearly taking the windshield (and me) out. We never got around to diagnosing the squeal ~ it, like all of Marge's neglected quirks (and my own), just became a part of Marge.
And then there was her interior. Dog hair. Oh my god, the dog hair. The consequence of making Marge into Lola's "crate" for episodes of social anxiety when visitors come to our house, such as the kids' music teacher, a friend small enough for Lola to hump, or actually anyone at all... Add to her hair, Lola's greasy marrow bones, tension-relievers for the poor exiled creature that leave a stinky smear all over the leather seats. Then add the lollipop sticks with sticky ends, gathering the dog hair, jammed in the cup holders in the back, and Gatorade bottles from two baseball seasons ago and Cheetos mashed into the carpet and gum hardened into the seatbelt clips... Those boys, the very same whose BEGGING compelled me to get this minivan on December 14, 2014 (but who's counting), had begun to BEG again to dispose of her. "The van is gross!" "Let's get a Ford Explorer!" "A Suburban!"
And yet, though I've been waiting three years 11 months and some days to get rid of that van, my conscience cringed, as did our bank account. Replacement is not an option ~ we will drive that van into the ground. But it was deeper. Over time, I've come to identify with her. I am the beat-up middle aged vessel with a shockingly high number of miles on her.
Bless Jordy Green's good heart, he saw the value in re-investing in Marge rather than disposing of her. He took her to the Toyota dealer, discovering that most of the repairs were still covered by the extended warranty he had insisted we get when we bought her, already used with 54,000 miles. Hooray!
Her overhaul was MAJOR. It took almost a month, in and out of the shop. But when it was over, and after Tucker initiated an interior deep clean, we all remembered what a good pack mule our minivan is. That's when we realized: Maybe part of our disrespect was that we never named it. Or her, as we all somehow agreed she was. Hmmm.
After tossing options about, we settled on Marge. Like Marge Simpson. Like Frances McDormand's pregnant cop in Fargo. She is our Marge. Solid, broad, hard-working, unglamorous. Deserving of our respect and gratitude.
As we got to the bus stop this morning, I asked the boys, "Guys, why do you think the Audi doesn't have a name?" They didn't have an answer but they quickly had suggestions: "Kareem!" shouted Duncan. "Tim!" shouted Tucker. "Tim is a dumb name! Too common!" shouted Reeve. "Well so is Kareem!" (Boy, they can get a wicked fight going about anything!) Diverting, I asked, "Why do you think you both came up with male names?" This quieted them for a moment. While they reflected, "I mean, I just think it's interesting you identify me with the Audi, but feel the Audi is a male." Still no answer. "That's cool," I said. "Maybe it means I've got male and female sides. Maybe it means I get to be both Marge and Tim-Kareem."
Time to catch the bus.
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