Although you never technically transported miniature blue cartoon characters from funeral parlors to crematoriums, you would have been the car they cast had they made the movie: Smurfette and her Erection Collection. You were, however, my leading, although somewhat effeminate, “man”.
I picked you out of a conformist lot of white, grey and black sedans when I was twenty-two. You may have been the runt in the litter, but you were electric blue and somehow, I found you endearing. Practically speaking of course, I knew I would never lose you in parking lot. You were my first new car – a Chrysler PT Cruiser – promising tailgates out the hatchback and parallel parking for dummies. I signed on the dotted line and you were my wheels to adulthood as we chugged along together, hugging life’s curves with your stubby little Firestones.
You and I withstood criticism. People wondered why I was with you. My sister called you hideous and refused to go for a ride - horrified some college guys might assume she was white trash from Melrose Park. Once while stopped at a red light on a beautiful summer day with the windows down, four teenage girls in ponytails taunted and pointed at you, “That’s a really UGLY car!” I know you wanted me to run them over, but I didn’t want to get blood on your blue hood. It would have looked a bit too patriotic.
You were my steady companion through seven years, five moves and three states. You silently tolerated honks, tears, egregious profanity, and twangy country music. You even saved my life once while parked outside a gelato shop in downtown St. Louis. The windows from a twenty-story building blew out, raining down on you like icicles, but you shielded me from debris as I dug around your seat cheeks for meter coins. I don’t dismiss the little things either. Throughout the years, you helped transport dry-cleaning, suitcases, and even that egg custard dessert I brought to a dinner party that sloshed around on your floor mat for twenty minutes until there was nothing left in the casserole dish. Your heated seats more than once tricked my friends into thinking they had wet their pants. And your brakes pads could rival any baby-on-a-plane in a screeching contest, especially after some rain. But, you never judged me. You were my steadfast companion, refusing to gossip even when I had to pee in a McDonald’s cup over your cushions while stuck in a Thanksgiving blizzard on I-55.
Granted, you have to admit to being a bit high maintenance. Always racking up hospital bills with some random hydraulic tube, coolant fluid, and new tires – not once or twice, but three times. You were always falling apart and frankly, your neediness began to reek of desperation. In your later years, you became a heavy breather – wheezing and gasping down the road - insinuating that I should just get out and put you on my back. It almost seemed as though you forgot that you were supposed to be the reliable one in our relationship. So, are you surprised I went and traded you in for a younger, hipper, bronzed model that has less girth? What can I say, you lost that spark plug. You didn’t really think I meant forever?
I will always think of you, my Smurf Hearse, when I see one of your relatives parading down the road. I will recall you fondly, remembering us both in our prime and our youth – wondering if you are somewhere, gallantly delivering Papa Smurf to his final resting place. After all, the dude’s getting old. I write this ode because in the butterflied excitement of my new motor of love, I forgot to even say goodbye. So think of this as a last little pat, one tender farewell. You looked so forlorn, so frightened, so alone - discarded and abandoned - in that brightly lit Hyundai dealership with foreign models sticking their grills up at your chubby handles. But, take comfort, my friend, as much as I cursed you, you were the car for me. And remember this when you are feeling your most blue - they always say you never really get over your first.
