It was really hard to convince myself that this was a good little car. It was! Wasn't it? Afterall I did tell the woman who bought it to take good care of it, and that I was sad to see it go. In reality, I'm not sad in the least bit, good riddance in fact! I do get sentimental when it comes to things that I use a bunch in my life and we part ways, almost like it dies.
Well, regardless a lot of good (and not so good) memories were made from it, and in it. Good 'ol stratus was the 4 wheel drive car it never could be driving over fields, curbs, grass, and anything else that might have been between me and where I wanted to be. This car has driven all over Minnesota, into Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Tenesse, North and South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida. Its been on a bunch of fun travelling adventures.
There is something really great about a car that taps some forgotten nostalgia in our generation. Like listening to Wet Sand on the edge of intolerably loud singing with your friends on the way home from buying the Stadium Arcadium album. Celebrating the new year on a bridge on the way to the bar because I got off work just a little too late. Laying half in the trunk with the windows down on a perfect summer night at the drive in. Knowing that the car drove Laura and I around on our first dates.
There are other less enjoyable memories. My first big repair, fixing a solenoid canister and paying like $200 at a time when I would have preferred spending $200 at the bar and grocery store. My first fender bender, a woman slid out of a parking lot into my front end. At least I got my wheels aligned for free. Smashing into a gigantic dead deer on the way to Chicago for a vacation. That was a huge headache and a smelly one too. The saddest memory of all was in this car was where my dog Chip died, at my arm, with me petting him. That memory was a hard one to get over for the next several weeks of driving.
Out with the old and in with the new! Right? I didn't replace it with my motorcycle, as much as I wish that was feasible. Nope, I inherited from my Grandpa's estate his 2005 Chrysler Sebring! The funny thing about this is I'm pretty much driving the same car, the outside is just grey instead of purple. I'm not kidding, the only major difference is the shape of the headlights, taillights, bumpers, and the accents around the speedometer. The advantage was that this car had 60,000 miles and the stratus 119,000. If someone ever wonders why Chrysler swindled the government for money (twice!) look no further than the cheap asses making the same car twice and charging a premium for the logo on one.
Lucky for me I have a insanely fun motorcycle to drive around for most of the year and a pretty unexciting (but useful) car to drive around during bad weather. I consider myself lucky.
As for the stratus, I think I'm done missing it.
