Jan 20, 2008 -
Reliability is Priceless
There's nothing like getting into your car on a cold January day, turning the key, and worrying about the crowd there's going to be at the SuperTarget, as opposed to getting into your car, turning the key, and hoping the car will start, wondering what else will go wrong today. Other than the time almost three years ago when the starter solenoid died, my 1998 Toyota Corolla has never made me worry about whether or not it will start. It has seen numerous show and ice storms and gotten me through unscathed, and I have gotten it through unscathed as well.
I have never garaged it, and so it has suffered some from our hailstorms and from my teenage and young adult neighbors at my apartment complex, who generally have no respect for property not their own. I even have a scrape on my hood that was obviously a gift from someone at SuperTarget who backed up a little too far into their parking space. These things are to be expected. After all, not everybody can afford a house with a garage, a lot of us are apartment and condo dwellers, and we don't all have the space to work on our cars even if we wanted to, and some of us even have to outsource the cleaning of our cars. So a car that presents few problems is a worthy investment. Corolla has been branded as "bland", but what's wrong with that, so long as the car functions as it was designed to? In the words of Jack Nicholson, do I want to "drive it or buy it a dress?!"
What I want to do, right now, is get in my car, turn the key, and go to 7-11 and get a coffee. And I don't want to think about my car while I'm doing so. I think ideally I wouldn't need a car at all; I do care about the carbon footprint I'm leaving, and don't feel my needs supersede those of the planet. But I don't live in a very walkable community, and buses are few or at inconvenient hours. So I'm happy to drive, and even happier to not worry about whether what I'm driving is going to let me down. If I tool all around town and come home after dark safely without ever thinking once about the car, then it's done the job I bought it to do.
No dress required.
