17,280 Minutes Without Wheels

My lovely Jeep decided it couldn't take it anymore. It's 10 years old. It has 126,000 miles. It commuted to Denver for a year while I (selfishly) went to grad school. It roared through thigh-high snow. It was rear-ended the day before I (selfishly) went to Italy with my mum. It faithfully stood by me for the last 6 years. I tried to listen to it as it groaned or moaned or quietly leaked coolant and really tried not to complain. But then, it happened...

My Jeep decided it had enough. The check engine light came on, the check gauges light shined its brilliant red, the oil pressure took a dive south, and the temperature was about 3.78 degrees lower than that of the sun's surface. Brilliant! At least it's communicating with me. But did it have to communicate everything at once? I kept taking it in to a mechanic who is (conveniently) 0.4 miles down the road so I could walk home after dropping it off. They put in a new radiator (finally) after tons of little ($200) fixes. I thought they had my best interest in mind and were carefully, methodically, diligently figuring out the exact reason for the sputtering, ticking, coolant-losing Jeep. But alas. I thought wrong.

Thankfully, I was referred to a brilliant mechanic who has taken 4 days to carefully, methodically, diligently figure out what is causing what...and refuses to simply fix the symptoms. Maybe, if I'm lucky enough, I'll get to "buy" my car back from the mechanic for $2000 to $3000 and not have to deal with car dealers. Gulp. So this makes day 12 without driving my vehicle. I could get used to this. It saves on gas. It saves on me "needing" to go to Target or other stores. So far, people have been great. I even had a client insist on picking me up to drive me 15 minutes north to finish up a project.

This has all helped me decide something very important.

I am selling my house.

I am moving into a tent.

I am buying a horse.

I'm naming him "Jeepers" in honor of the Jeep that fought oh-so-valiantly for these past years.

Happy times to come, I'm sure of it...

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