Racing to the end of an era

I don’t deal with change well.

It’s not that it frightens me (per se), but it startles me. Even when it’s good change, if it happens faster than I’m expecting, I get … alarmed, I guess.

Just me. I like having accurate expectations.

So Tuesday night we were at the Subaru dealership.

Now, when I bought the Saturn, back at the end of ’94, I did some shopping with Margie, we had lengthy discussions about the best way to get a good deal (relative-in-law-to-be worked for Hughes, and so got a GM discount), we shopped some more, and, ultimately, the car was bought.

But I wasn’t even there for the closing. I don’t recall precisely why — I wasn’t (quite) yet in Denver, since I drove out in the Saturn, but I was absent. But since the car was formally bought by Ginger (see the discount thang above), I wasn’t there. I didn’t even get my Saturn Send-off (and Jim & Ginger gracefully declined, then ribbed me about it unmercifully for years).

And it took a long time from inception to finish.

When we bought the van back in 2000, it took a while, too. We shopped. We looked. We read up. We test drove. We pondered financing options. We looked into the CostCo thing. We made appointments. We ordered a car that was scheduled to be delivered a week or two later. It was a little late, but eventually arrived.

And it took a long time from inception to finish.

In many ways, the current car purchase feels like it’s going by at lightning speed. Sure, I’ve been talking about it for months, and I did research a while back, and we were steadily chipping away at the previous loan. But the “it’s never going to happen” sense seemed to turn around really quickly.

And there we were on the lot Tuesday, and …

… well, we couldn’t buy the car we wanted then and there because we needed to research the financing. But the sales guy was going to put a hold tag on it, and let us take it for a spin — except, it turned out it was still on the truck, being delivered.

“But you could pick it up this weekend.”

This weekend?

And then he called last night, saying it had arrived, and it might be ready Friday, but they had to fluid it up and make sure it was all okay.

Friday?!

No doubts, no second thoughts, no “What are we getting into?” panicking, but, jeez, it’s like running down to the store and just buying something. This is a car, fer gosh sakes. It should be a major, tortuous, lengthy, never-ending-until-that-final-triumphant-moment event.

Okay. I’m better now.

So along with the sense that events are hurtling forward at 0.9C, I’ve been having major attacks of the Nostalgies about the Saturn since Tuesday. Like …

Will I ever fill up the car again?
Will I ever drive it to the comic book store again?
Will I ever drive it to work again?

Yeah, silly, but in addition to being disexpecationally averse, I’m also a crazy romantic (just ask Margie). That Saturn marks some serious milestones in my life. It was the first Post-Divorce Car, and since it was also Pre-Marriage, it was the last My Car (ignoring the registration irregularities).

It was also the car that I drove out to Colorado (with Margie) in, and I bought it right about that time, so it’s tied heavily to my whole life and career here, which seems like Forever (in a good way).

It was the first car I had with power windows.

It’s probably the last car I’ll own with flip-up headlights (that being out of fashion these days, with daytime running lights being the new norm). I grew up at a time when that was the coolest thing around, a feature of true luxury and technological gee-whizery.

It’s also probably the last car I’ll own with an analog odometer (which, again romantically, is a shame — something about the odometer actually rolling over to a milestone is romantic as all hell).

And it’s the last car I’ll own that didn’t have a CD player. That last one is a good thing. When I bought the Saturn in late ’94, CD players were a higher-end option. Within a year, they were standard on everything. Meanwhile, I’m stuck between left-wing twaddle and right-wing ranting on the AM dial, and “drive-time” inanities on FM. The Subaru has a 6-CD in-dash player, which I’m looking forward to very much, thank you.

While I’m sure I’ll miss the Saturn’s dent-proof plastic siding, I won’t miss the accompanying light-weight “blow on me hard and I’ll spin around the wet highway” handling.

The Saturn is probably as close as I’ll ever get to something that looks like a sports car. Practicality and Margie’s good sense may let me get something that drives very sporty, but I’m unlikely to have something quite with the same lines as the Saturn.

Almost 90,000 miles worth of memories on that thing. And, like I said, I’m a romantic, and so get all soppy-eyed over that sort of thing. Is this the last time I’ll drive in here with Katherine in the car seat in back? Yeesh.

Ah, well. We’ll see. We may pick up the Subaru this afternoon (eep!). And, if we do, I’ve promised Margie that she can take it over to the D&D game tonight and show it off Although she opined that I could drive along behind her to be there when she does.

Life is good.