Narrative

Picking Up My Car

My car is one of my most prized possessions.  Whenever I step foot inside and turn the key in the ignition, my day instantly gets better.  Many moments led up to the acquisition of my car, including moments of despair, anticipation, and excitement.  The months leading up to the day when I would pick up my car seemed long and unending, but when the day finally came, I was beyond thrilled.  I remember vividly the day when I picked it up from the dealership, as it lit the entire lot with its yellow paint as bright as the sun.  

But before getting into that fateful moment, a brief explanation of why I chose the car that I did.  I am a gear head.  In other words, I love cars, whether it be European exotics, luxury sedans, or good old fashion American Muscle.  My favorite car of them all, however, happens to be an American Muscle car called the Chevrolet Camaro, which, for those who have seen or heard of the Transformers movies, it is known as Bumblebee.  Bumblebee swiftly became the nickname for my new car as friends and family alike saw the yellow paint and black stripes.  Who can blame them?  The similarities are vast, and I am okay with being able to tell children that I drive Bumblebee.  But to me, I don’t view the car as Bumblebee.  I view it as a good friend, as the one whom I can turn to when I am upset, or if I need to get away, or simply if I would just like to go for a drive.  My car is always there, lighting up my day.

Before obtaining my Camaro, however, I had many trials and tribulations to persevere, such as persuading parents that I could handle the responsibility, and budgeting my money and time for such a thing.  The persuasion did not come easy, but after a few months of often frustrated, but occasionally calm and collected, conversations with both parents, they finally saw my point of view: the view that I not only wanted this car, but had thought through every possible obstacle in my way from that moment, all the way into the distant future.  I showed them that I could budget my money accordingly for such an investment, and that I would treat the car with the utmost respect.  Because this is not just a car that I plan to lease for three years and then forget about.  This is a car I want long term, maybe even 15 to 20 years from now.  Something my dad understood very well, as he was a Camaro owner when he was in college as well, and felt the same way about his Camaro that I do about mine.  “You’re going to wash the paint off of it” he always tells me, metaphorically describing how often I clean the car, inside and out.  Yet I still think it could be even cleaner.

Leading up to saving enough money for the Camaro, however, was going to be a process that would take up my entire spring and summer of 2013.  Or so I thought.  As I was on my way to school during the last week of my senior year in high school, I pulled up to a stop sign in my previous car, about to turn left onto my school’s road.  Business as usual for me.  A mid-sized Lexus was in front of me, with a “STUDENT DRIVER” sticker in the rear window, and had pulled out in front of somebody when turning left onto my school’s road.  Business as usual for an average teenage driver.  So she backed up, behind the stop sign, letting the man she had cut-off continue on his travels.  I figured I would give her some extra room, considering she was a student driver, so I backed up a few feet, but had to stop because I had an increasing line of cars behind me, waiting.  As I sat in my car, waiting for the student driver to go, I noticed that her reverse lights were still on.  Not business as usual.  Immediately I see her brake lights cease, and suddenly a Lexus was on top of my car’s hood.  Obviously upset by this, I immediately got out of my car and went to see the damage.  The front bumper was smashed, and the hood completely bent from the impact.  But enough drama; all was well in the end, and the student driver and her mother agreed to pay for the damage out of pocket.  This meant good news for me, as my previous car was not worth fixing after all, and so that money helped with getting my Camaro.

Then, the moment arrived.  That saturday, as I left work and headed straight for my dad’s house, I was fidgety with joy.  I repeatedly bugged him, “Dad can we go yet?”.  “No” he would reply, “It’s not quite ready yet.  Let’s wait 30 more minutes.”  Those 30 minutes passed by at a quarter of the speed, or so it seemed.  But finally, we embarked for the dealership.  As we pulled into the lot, I remember seeing a bright yellow image out of the corner of my eye.  Upon seeing it, my heart actually fluttered, as if seeing a high school crush in the hallway.  And once the key had been given to me, I felt as if I had just asked that crush out, and she had said “Yes!”