I miss the old car, but...

This was the car that I've been driving for, what... the past four years... a '94 Caprice. I loved it, it drove well, had good gas mileage, the trunk was huge. Remote control for the doors and trunk. Loved it.

It was the last car Steve's uncle, Jimmy Lyon, sold to us from the Chevrolet dealers in Burlington before he died from cancer two years ago. Jimmy sold us nearly every car we had ever driven from the time we first moved to North Carolina... and that has been since 1975.

We miss his uncle Jimmy, and his wife who passed before him, Joyce. They were good people. Raised up four kids of their own, and I don't remember how many grandkids.

We always trusted Jimmy to find us a good car, a good deal. He didn't know much about fixing the cars, but he could sell them. He was a great story teller, and always had a clean, well turned joke to tell us when we would visit him at his home or his office.

Ah, Jimmy and Joyce... we miss you both ...

So when my car broke down just after we got back from our Florida vacation, Steve tried to make the repairs to keep it running for me. We finally had to face the awful truth: we were going to have to let the Caprice go. It was going to cost more than the car was worth to fix it, Steve found out. It was time to look for a new vehicle for me. That was about three weeks before school started that I began experiencing serious car troubles.

                                    

I don't know what part he's trying to replace here, but it didn't correct the problem. He adjusted things, replaced parts, and even had a computer analysis done on it.

All indications pointed to "Get a new car!"

Normally,Steve would have called his uncle and told him what he was looking for (a used car for his wife to drive to school, clean, something practical, not too much mileage, four doors, a cd player, you know, some conveniences)... nothing fancy. Good price. Jimmy always came through with something just right. The Caprice had been the nicest car I had ever driven. I hated to let it go.

Steve searched the internet for some local cars. For three weeks he has been looking at photos, visiting car lots, calling people up, driving the 'new' cars, but nothing jumped out at him and said "I'm the one!"

Until last week. He saw it. He checked out it's value. He looked at it in the lot. Called me at school today and said he had bought a car for me. We would pick it up after school.

                                    

It's a silver frost 2003 Ford Taurus SES. I don't know all the mechanical things to tell you about it, but it has all the things I wanted, including good gas mileage, smooth drive, nice trunk space (not as roomy as the Caprice, though), and a cd player that works. It has just over 109,000 miles on it. Brand new tires. This is my first car with a working cd player. (The Caprice had one, but it never worked from day 1. Wasn't a big point with us at the time.) 

                                   

It's clean... I mean clean inside and outside. I can't wait to drive it to school tomorrow. Steve drove it home tonight so he could fill it up for me (I had filled his car (Buick Century) up two days ago, so it's only fair!).

After he got home, I hopped inside and took it for a spin up the road. Drives very nice... I like it already. I told him thank you... and "you done good."