Like a lot of people I loved my first car but it has been a long time since I cared about an automobile. I avoid attachment to objects, especially those that get awful gas mileage.
For a while my wife and I got by without a second car. It was inconvenient but even in the days when they were giving gas away for $2 a gallon, going without saved money.
So, it was with trepidation that we inherited a 1995 Buick Century from my wife’s grandfather a couple of years ago.
He wasn’t your typical old guy but Pepe, as we knew him, sure had a lot of old guy traits, including a big car. By today’s standards it was a boat or what my friends called an Olds…mobile. Regardless, he thought to leave it to us and that always meant a lot to me.
We called it the PepeMobile.
In it I found myself driving erratically, sometimes too fast, sometimes too slow. I’m not going to say I drove like an old person but maybe l drove in a way that younger people think seniors drive.
Pepe even left a pair of those huge wrap around sunglasses in the glove box. I liked to throw those babies on and slouch down behind the wheel. Other drivers always gave me a wide berth.
Despite being 13 years old, the Buick’s odometer hadn’t yet hit 48,000. You could feel every precious mile he’d driven. Most of them were racked up traveling back and forth from his apartment to a nursing home to visit his wife.
Recently, we traded the car in. It hurt. I grew to love that hunk of metal. The Buick rode nice, taking corners in fine wide arcs. In its day it was a luxury sedan. Still, the steering felt loose. At high speeds it may have been dangerous. And you can’t fight the calendar. Rust spots were showing up. The fuel lines were ready to go. The time had come.
It was left to me to clean out the car, a sad job. I found loose change, winter gloves, a scrap of paper with his handwriting, a pair of reading glasses, each a tangible hint at the man.
Every time I got behind the wheel I could hear Pepe’s booming laugh. He probably would have enjoyed the time the brakes stopped working and I almost ran into a mailbox.
It sounds silly in this new “Green” era to think about a car this way but the PepeMobile will always be special.
The last time I ever saw Pepe he shook my hand and said, “take care of that family of yours.”
“I promise,” I said.
He must have known something was up. Not long after, he was gone. Life moves fast. A few moments along the way get burnt into your psyche and that’s one for me.
As hard as it was to let that car go, I like to think Pepe would’ve been happy. Two years after he left us he was helping me keep my promise.
This column originally appeared in The Sun Chronicle