“We must always change, renew, rejuvenate ourselves; otherwise we harden.” ~Goethe
This is the second in a series of letters between me and my friend, author Margaret Roach, on the challenges (and joys!) of aging. I’m Old (just 55) and she’s Older (facing 60 this year). And since we’re surely not the only ones buying wrinkle creams, we decided to share our exchange with you, too. Be sure to read Margaret’s letter to me here.
Dear Older,
Oh Margaret! You would have to bring up our cars.
Well, I’m not going to lie about age here. Yes, my Acura is ten years old. And she’s about to roll over 170,000 miles – that’s a lot of trips taken, a great deal of life lived, many bridges crossed.
Buying this car was the first thing Steve and I did in 2003 when we left the suburbs of Boston and moved back to my country roots. If we were going to make our home in a place where the last snow might not melt til mid-April, I wanted a car that would carry me through our Northern winters without too much anxiety on my part. “Good in snow” was my top priority when we went out shopping for new wheels.
It’s worth remembering that gas cost $1.54 a gallon when we arrived in New Hampshire to embark on this new life. “Good mileage” was on my list, but it was somewhere below good visibility, comfort, and safety.
Jack was eleven and Henry was just starting high school when I began driving the kids around rural New Hampshire in my brand new silver MDX. (Family trips we took in our Toyota Sienna minivan – plenty of room for two parents, two boys, one dog and gear for all, and already showing the wear and tear of four years of hard daily use.) The Acura was the nice car. My car. And, I’ll admit: it was and is the only car I’ve ever loved.
A little back story: I’m not a natural behind the wheel. I shudder to recall my first solo forays on our rural roads after I got my driver’s license in 1974. The car: my parents’ 1970 red Plymouth Fury sedan, graciously bequeathed to me. The most notable feature of that car was its size. Huge. I have vague, unsettling memories even now of drifting around curves in the road, wondering if I was going a little too fast, fighting to hold the car on the pavement, straining to sit tall enough in the broad, slippery seat to see out the windshield. To drive that car was to experience the rather surreal sensation of hurtling down the road at the wheel of a small houseboat, guiding it along its way with a white knuckle grip.
The first time I was given permission to take the Plymouth on a trip beyond my well-worn daily routes of school, work, and friends’ houses, it was to drive to Lowell, where my three best friends and and I would park, hop on a train to the Boston Garden and attend a Neil Young concert.
I’d never driven in an unfamiliar neighborhood, or maneuvered down a crowded city street, or negotiated my way through narrow passages between parked cars. By the time I finally docked the mammoth Fury at the train station, I’d clipped off not one but both of my side mirrors, in two separate heart-stopping incidents.
Trying to explain the pair of accidents to my parents the next morning, the best I could offer was: “I’m just never really sure where the car ends and the air begins.”
Skip ahead thirty years. Time and experience and a dedicated yoga practice have given me a better sense of where I am in space. After years of panic attacks at the wheel, avoiding city driving at all costs, and doing everything I can to get out of driving at night, I am actually a pretty confident driver. I have to be. I’m the main chauffeur for two boys with wildly disparate interests.
In sharp contrast to our geographically concentrated urban life, everything in the country is spread out and far apart. Our new schedule requires weekly trips to Boston for piano lessons and treks all over the Southern part of the state for Little League baseball games. The house we’re building is on one side of a mountain, the schools our sons attend on the other – and there are multiple daily crossings, in all kinds of weather. We travel to AAU basketball games and All-State Concerts and field trips and jobs at summer camps in Maine. Once a month I return to our old home town for my book group meeting. A dear friend and former neighbor gets sick; I make up an excuse every week to make the three-hour round trip to see her. Jack enrolls in boarding school three hours away, and for three years I make drive after drive, learning the road to the Berkshires by heart.
The miles add up. And my car, my trusty Acura, never lets me down. The car feels like an extension of me. I know exactly where it ends and where space begins. We are in synch, well-matched fellow travelers.
Meanwhile, first one son then the other comes of age and passes the driving test. I take a deep breath and hand over my keys. I sit in the passenger seat one winter morning as my son Henry drives us off the road and straight into a tree, having glanced down for a moment to look for a CD case. (Three months in my mom’s borrowed Subaru while my car’s in the shop only makes me appreciate my sturdy, graceful MDX all the more. It is fixed at last, good as new, ready for the exploits of the next brother.)
I spend many nights staring at the ceiling, waiting for the sound of the garage door opening and closing again, signaling the safe return of an adolescent son. My nose is good: no matter how carefully the car’s been checked by its teenaged occupants or how long the windows have been rolled down to air out telltale scents, I can always piece together a morning-after story. I sniff the air, pick up bits of trash from the floor, check the GPS history. I’m a mother. There are no secrets.
These days–to my relief– there are no stories, either. No one asks for my keys anymore. Henry, living in New York, makes his way in the world by subway. Jack, in school in Atlanta, is thrilled with his own first car, a used Volkswagen Jetta that he wisely kept off the road during this winter’s crazy southern storms. Steve celebrated a brief break in our tuition-paying-cycle last year by treating himself to his own “dream car,” a Chevy Volt that runs 44 miles on a charge, gets 40 miles to the gallon when it switches to gas and boasts a great sound system, plush seats, and sleek styling.
Everyone has moved on, it seems, but me.
I did go out last fall and test drive a few new models: a Ford Escape, a Honda CR-V, a Mazda CX-5. All those gadgets! The fancy dashboards, Bluetooth and audio streaming, and back-up cameras were intimidating. Sure a USB port would be nice — books on tape for the road! — but at the end of the day, all I really wanted to do was climb back into my familiar seat, slip in an Alison Krause CD, and point the reliable old gal toward home.
Instead of a new car, I treated my silver friend to a day in the shop and had all her dings and dents pulled out – the automotive equivalent of Botox, I suppose. She returned to me looking years younger, perky and clean, although of course the odometer reveals the unavoidable truth: try as we might to hold on the illusion of youth, such struggles are in vain.
So yes, we’re in the same boat here, Margaret. To give up our cars is also to acknowledge so much else that’s over. It’s to let go of who we each were ten years ago. (Would we have had time to be such close friends back then? My guess is not.) And it’s to step into futures that feel so much less certain than our rigorously productive, wide-ranging pasts.
The day I trade in my car is the day I’ll also sever an ineffable strand connecting the younger, busier, faster-moving me of ten years ago to the older, less entangled empty nester I am today. Good-bye to the last vestiges of soccer mom, hello to. . .whom??
The answer to that question is still a work in progress. But here’s my thought. We’re both in good shape and life is long. Our cars may be worn out, but we aren’t. I see adventures on the horizon. Road trips, perhaps. Voyages of discovery, with jazzy soundtracks courtesy of our new four-speaker sound systems.
It’s time to get a move on. West Springfield you say? Just as soon as I get plowed out from this latest snowstorm. . .
Love,
Old
P.S. To our readers: Are you attached to your old cars, too? Got any recommendations for us when we go out for those test drives? Margaret is over here, with her aging Saab story; this is my response. And if you missed our first letters, they are here. Of course, we’d love to hear from you, too!
Ahh the Acura MDX.! One of my few remnants of having raised two boys in the suburbs of New Jersey. She’s a good old car and I really don’t want to get rid of her. She runs well and has navigation and XM radio (which was huge thing back then). And she’s only 10 years old and has only 90,000 miles on her. I think I will Keep her until she can go no more. She is an old friend and I can’t bear to let her go. When I bought her my older son was 11 and my younger son was eight. The criteria for the new SUV back then was hat it had to fit 4hockey bags and 4 teenage hockey players. She did me well. For all rhose car pools. Many early-morning hockey runs in strange states on the East Coast to make it to the rink for a 6 AM game time. Some say she still has that scent of those days gone by. but I love her nonetheless and I’m not ready to trade her in. So what I did last year was buy a slightly used 10-year-old BMW convertible. After all, everyone needs to drive a convertible at some point in her life. Right now the two girls sit in the garage. The BMW hasn’t been driven for months because of all the snow on the ground. She only has rear wheel drive, and I think the battery might be dead. But the old black, 4 wheel drive Acura MDX is still my ride of choice!(Don’t get me started on the 1971 big, blue Pontiac Catalina I drove in my senior year of college!)
Whenever I see an MDX on the road I think: kindred! They really are the best. My dad, at 79, (a guy who’s never been without a pick-up truck) finally treated himself to an old BMW convertible — and sometimes I get to drive it.
I LOVE our honda civic. It’s small but it handles great in the snow and the rain and gets great mileage. It has over 200,000 miles on it is still is going strong. We are no where near thinking about replacing it, which is nice.
Aidan drove it to the pass for two years of working up there teaching skiing and had to go in the worst of storms. It’s been a great vehicle the entire 10+ yrs we have owned it. Good luck picking a new one..
Honda, yes! That’s my criteria now: good in snow, good mileage, and a car that I can put 200,000 miles on — as this all reminds me that I really don’t like shopping for a car.
I have always been something of a car fanatic – probably because I grew up in Detroit and the automotive industry was our “family business.” What first attracted me to my husband to be was his mean looking 1971 Mach-One Mustang, special edition, with silver racing stripes. “Whose car is THAT in your driveway?” I asked my piano teacher when I ran down the stairs into her basement for my lesson. The young man sitting on the piano bench turned around and smiled at me. “It’s mine,” he said. “Would you like a ride?”
The rest, dear reader, is history. In the meantime, I have driven a Pontiac Trans Am, a Chevrolet Corvette, and enjoyed a long and loyal relationship with a 1998 Ford Taurus.
My favorite car in recent history was a 2007 Saab turbo 9.3 – the only “foreign” car I ever drove (remember, I’m a Motor City girl!). I felt young and stylish and carefree in that little baby. Sadly it was a two year lease, and the residual price to purchase was just outrageous.
Some 40-odd years later, we still like cars in our family. My husband now drives a bright red Dodge Charger with a Hemi engine, and keeps a 1998 red Trans Am in the garage for summer joy riding. I, somewhat sadly, have evolved into what I call an “old lady” car (a 2010 Fusion), the better to transport dogs and elderly relatives around town.
But I still harbor a slight desire to own a shiny black Mustang of my own before my children take away my car keys – which I hope is years in the offing!
Oh no, I hadn’t even thought of the what awaits at the end of this journey: the kids taking OUR keys away. All the more reason to get a ride we love now, right?
I enjoy your columns. However, they are becoming repetitive. Perhaps you should stop reminiscing about when the boys were young and start writing about your life now.
That comment is mean. If you haven’t read Katrina’s newest book MAGICAL JOURNEY yet you should, she talks all about this stage in her life! I must say if you don’t have something nice to say, say nothing! Katrina’s readers do not read her blog to read negative comments posted!
Arlene….I have to agree with Kathy! For Katrina-I saw this today and thought of you- “If your number one goal is to make sure that everyone likes and approves of you, then you risk sacrificing your uniqueness, and, therefore, your excellence.” -Unknown Stay with your uniqueness and excellence because lots of us relate to your writing and love it!!
Hmmm..my first thought when I read responses like this are…you don’t have to keep reading this blog. Life isn’t a one-size-fits-all experience. Sometimes things fit for a time and then it is time to move on. If that is what you decide to do, then I wish you well on your journey.
I myself do not find these blogs repetitive at all. I hear a wise and humble woman admitting to loving what was (for which I am grateful) and learning how to face and then embrace the present and future(for which I am also grateful). It is fitting for me!
I believe it is very hard to live in our present and plan for our future without first reflecting upon the joys and hardships of the past. Katrina (and family) invites us to embark on our personal journeys by being a part of and learning from her experiences. One can choose whether or not to be a part of her journey through her blog and books. I thank Katrina and her family for baring their private lives….I have learned that mine is not so unique after all!
I think we need to be right where we are at any given time, wherever that is. I think Katrina is right where she needs to be at the moment. I appreciate her candor, her honest reflection on life, aging and being a woman.
The cars are metaphors for stages of our lives. Thank you, Katrina, for sharing your well written thoughts. You capture what many of us are going through. And, it helps along the journey to find a kindred spirit along the way.
The cars are simply metaphors for stages of our lives. Thank you, Katrina, for sharing these thoughts in such beautifully written text. Many of us are going through this journey, and it is comforting to find a kindred spirit along the way
My 2004 Jag is over 100,000 miles also and it made me smile as I was reading. As an only child, and this being the first car that was mine vs. a family car, I feel exactly the
same. My husband keeps hinting about mileage, etc. Not a chance of parting with her. She is just my size, four-wheel drive, safe and has 12 years of giggles, songs and
games with our granddaughters in the back seat. She’s family!
Love these memories — and the way some cars just “fit” our lives!
I’ve already posted on Margaret’s blog about my similar car dilemmas, but must post here too to show some appreciation! I’m so excited to have been introduced to your blog through A Way to Garden. I read Mitten Strings when I was rocking my baby son eleven and a half years ago and began reading Ordinary Day when I saw Margaret’s post about you (I purchased it a couple years ago in anticipation of the preteens and teens :)!) Now I’ve purchased Magical Journey and I’m not waiting, it’s next after I finish Ordinary Day (interspersed with several other reads :)). You very much feel like a kindred spirit – thank you L M Montgomery and Anne for that phrase! Good luck with your car situation – I hope it keeps going as long as you need to make a transition! Love your books and your blog!
I love how you always take me ‘there’ in your words. Shotgun today – thank you. xoxoxo
I have no attachments to cars. We buy them old and we buy them used and they just get older and more used the longer we own them. And when we’re done with our car (we’ve always been a one car family) we’re ready to upgrade to a “newer” model, something that is seven to ten years old.
Oh, my favorite car was my Acura Legend. I held on to that car until it hit 210,000 miles (maybe more?). Never had to do anything but routine maintenance on it. Loved, loved, loved that car. Finally, its time was up and sadly, I said goodbye. I’ve been driving Hondas ever since…minivan when my kids were young and now a Pilot, which I love (except for the gas mileage). However, it serves its purpose as I carpool home from school carrying 5 boys. I still miss my Legend…Acura doesn’t even make that model anymore.
Hi, Katrina .
Mine was Toyota Camry 2004. I used to drive her 7-8 hrs, from Virginia beach to New Jersey every month, sometimes twice or more for my husband’s meeting. I love to drive, I loved the long drive and sceneries. And this car never failed me, but she was gone now when we moved here to California. I was heartbroken, heartsick until now. When I see similar car on the freeway, I would shout, that’s my car. I know, I sound crazy but I truly miss her until know.
It is such a loss.
Thank you for your well written story, it never fails to tug at my heartstring.
Oh my…is the age of the car related to our age? I have you both beat on both counts! My 1996 white Toyota Avalon spends the winter in our garage in NH…while my 2000 also white Avalon carries me back and forth to work etc. here in TX. My husband’s silver gray 2008 Avalon (see a trend here?) is our New car and we want to get an SUV maybe a Subaru, Tahoe? Suggestions as we hope to retire in the next few years…we are already 66! And now have to have a “new” car to keep the new grandchild safe! Our daughter drove our Volvo 4 years at the University of Texas…same car she rode in as a baby in a car seat. We finally gave it to the Salvation Army. I cried. Yeah…you are preaching to the choir here! Maybe it’s the native New Englanders that we are!
Holly in Texas
As a single mother, I always swore that I would never own a minivan. Somehow I thought that owning a minivan would put me into a different status and immediately mark me as undesirable in the dating world. I kept that promise to myself even after I figured out that someone who decides not to date a person because of their vehicle was never worth dating in the first place. However, when my youngest son was in middle school, his hobbies forced me to make different vehicle choices and I ended up with an SUV that could tow a trailer, first for his ATV and then for his race car.
I fell in love with SUVs and will probably never go back to having a car. Now that my children are all grown, the SUV gives me more room to follow my passion – rescue companion animals. It’s very difficult to fit a dog cage in the back of a car, and no one wants a litter of puppies loose in the back seat!
While I may not have personally kept my cars for 10 years, several have remained in the family and have continued to serve us well. When my middle son came home from college, he needed a vehicle for his job search. By then my Jeep Cherokee was almost five years old, so I passed it along to him because it was easier to buy a new vehicle than try to juggle schedules and make sure everyone got where they needed to be on time. A new Chevrolet Trailblazer replaced the Jeep as my personal vehicle, but my middle son is still driving the Jeep that has over 160,000 miles on it.
Six years later, I was still very happy and comfortable with the Trailblazer but circumstances again presented me with an opportunity to look at new vehicles. My youngest son was about to become a first-time father and his little Toyota Tacoma truck – while perfect for pulling his race car – wouldn’t accommodate a baby seat. On the day that my grandson was born, I presented my son and daughter-in-law with the keys to the Trailblazer. My grandson will be two in a few months and, every time I visit and see the Trailblazer in their driveway, I silently thank it for being such a reliable vehicle and taking such good care of the precious cargo it now carries.
I drive a 1995 toyota corolla with 179,000 miles on it. There have been a few bumps and bents but it has been a great car and I am not yet ready to part with it.
I paid for it myself with my own ‘work’ money and it has been a great investment.
Katrina
Please buy North American…or at least manufactured here!!
I love my Jeep grand Cherokee…and it will handle whatever mother nature has to throw at you and with this winter you have just had I would think high and 4 wheel drive would be on your radar….
I live on Beautiful Vancouver Island in Canada and the only snow we see we have to drive to the mountain to find but it is still a perfect car and easy for older folks to get in and out of….and being almost 60 myself and I have arthritis is it an important part of the buying process..
I can so relate. Just last month, I got my first new car in many many years – I drove an old 2001 Volvo V70 wagon for the last 10 years (and it wasn’t new when I got it!), and when I left it at the dealer who generously gave me $1000 for it, she had over 208,000 miles on her! I too felt like I was leaving a piece of me behind. My boys had grown up in that car, the built-in booster seats were a dream when the boys were small and it was safe, reliable and even through a few minor accidents, in pretty good shape overall. Besides the increasing mileage, the real reason I got rid of her was my new job. I used to work in the town I live in so no commute, but my new job is 35 miles one way so we decided to take the safe route and get the new car.
I love my Hyundai 2013 Santa Fe, but part of me missed the memories that I left in my old blue Volvo….
Thank you for your blog, and sharing your thoughts about getting older. I really look forward to learning more about how you’re handling things each time I read your posts. I feel like there’s too much focus on staying young and grasping at youth and not enough advice or wisdom about how to grow older, something I am always seeking these days. So your blog and your books are a welcome source of advice and encouragement.
Katrina,
Even though it sounds like you didn’t enjoy your mom’s Subaru very much, you might want to try a new Outback. I have a 2012, which my husband says handles better in the snow than his huge Toyota Tundra pick up—and we had quite a winter in the Chicago area, with frequent drives around the lake to Michigan! Full-time AWD, great gas mileage, and manufactured in Indiana. You can get the bells & whistles (heated leather seats, bluetooth, navigation etc–or not) My fondest car memories were of my 1992 blue Volvo 240. She carried us through the childhood years in all her sturdy blue boxy glory! When the kids started driving her, they nicknamed her ‘Volverine’ haha! We retired her in 2006 at over 200K. We’ve also have 2 Honda Elements (which are no longer made)–also great in the snow, but not as good as the Subaru.
I love Subarus and have had many. I currently own a previously loved 1998 Forester that I have had for 9 years. It is ready, rugged and reliable like me. Ha! I like to think.
I can even put my little kayak inside or my bike or skis. It has no high-tech features to complicate things. I live on a steep hill in Maine and have never been stuck yet in the snow.
I have to weigh in on how much I love my Subaru outback!
It’s my first Subaru and it’s only 3 years old, but I am a fan.
After jeeps, Volos, an old Saab and a beloved VW Beetle
I love my Subaru! Oh my I sound like a commercial.
I am in love with my new Subaru Outback. Actually, this is my 5th Subaru station wagon. I keep getting them because they are such great cars. They can carry heavy loads like musical instruments, camping gear, and when the kids move from dorm to dorm, or home after graduation or to that apartment they share with their buddies. When I was single, I had an AMC Hornet, in 1972. It was orange and white. I named
the car Robert Redford. It was my first car and I was very nostalgic about it. Cars are like a favorite sweater, or a family pet. If you love them, you take care of them. They are part of your history. Thanks for the reminder. This past week, my car did not like me because it was outside in this horrible weather. I felt very guilty because I cannot fit it in my garage.
My Honda Accord turned 15 years old this month and is at 270,000 miles. My dad loved new cars, and when he could no longer drive, he bought his last new car and gave it to me – that was in 1999. My dad died in 2001, and my mom just passed away the day after Christmas. This car is a symbol of all their love for me. It will be really hard to let it go when the time comes. I have never had a car this long or one that had this many miles. I still drive it everyday and it is running well, but I know at some point I will have to say goodbye to it. That really will be a symbolic close to the final chapter with my mom and dad.
I had a wonderful white Honda Accord for 9 years. My sons drove it while learning to drive, one of them having a couple of accidents in it. This car never needed anything other than regular maintenance. I LOVED that car. When we returned to New England, I decided to get something new, and traded my beloved Honda in at the Subaru dealership in Milford. Every time I drove by and saw my baby in the back lot, I said “I’m sorry”, feeling like a traitor.
I bought that Subaru, and quite soon, I traded it in for a Volvo, and soon again, I found my second dream car: a Toyota Highlander. Never mind that it is green, and vaguely Scottish in my mind. I had read Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander, and even traveled to Scotland, so, perhaps it was subconscious.
Let me just say that I adore this car! It’s a 2005, so I’ve had it 9 years. At first I filled it with AFS (foreign exchange) students in my job as a district rep. Now, two of our grandchildren live with us in the summer and we go a lot of places! Dance and violin lessons, picnics and kayaking at the lake, over to our beach place in Rye. We listen to books on CDs, sing at the top of our lungs, and make up games together in that car. It is my home away from home.
I hope it lasts a really long time!
My first car was old when I got it. It was a 1970 AMC Rebel that I promptly named Isaac. No special reason for the name, but it seemed to fit. Isaac and I traveled around the city and then off to graduate school in Upstate New York. He was built like a tank and was always reliable for me, but not for others. When I finally became employed, I had to trade him in. It broke my heart. I cried all the way to the dealer and back. And I think Isaac felt it to. When I was pulling out of the dealer’s lot in my shiny new car, I looked back and Isaac would not start for the guy. I stopped, got out, walked over and sat in the driver’s seat one last time. He promptly purred to life — one last goodbye.
I understand this affection for a car; unfortunately, I am not experiencing such love at the moment. I like my cars ok – a Prius for around town, a Highlander for the snow-but it was my grandmother’s old 89 Volvo wagon, given to me when she died, that I mourn for. I loved that car, and imagined my daughter driving it around town, too. Boxy, safe, and full of memories, but alas, she gave out a few years ago. I’m not sure I’ll ever feel the same!
I’m a widow of 12 yrs. and 77 years of age, so I know something of older age. I live alone with my loved dog. I love Katrina Kenison’s books. They speak to me of my own thoughts on life. I am from the generation before decent birth control, therefore I gave birth to six very wanted and loved babies within the first seven yrs of married life
I met the love of my life when I was just 16 and lost him almost 47 yrs later.
That old saying “everyone has a story” is true. I’m no exception,but, it’s not for here.
I’ve always been fascinated with old people. So many are inspiring. On PBS tv I saw a documetry called “Over 90 and loving it”. My sister found a copy and sent it to me. It’s my favorite. Life is wonderful, no matter your age!
What a wonderful tale – and i can so relate ! I just turned in my silver 2001 BMW – and i can’t believe the mixed feelings i had in driving off with a new one. It was so upsetting to be in this fancy new “creature” when all i wanted was to be back in my comfortable old friend. I loved the vintage, simplicity and sturdiness of it all – i too have 2 sons that drove around endlessly with me, took trips to new hampshire to look for property, and now one is in college with his own vintage volvo. So many memories and emotions that you stirred up – thanks for great writing!
Our 2002 Honda Odyssey, now serving us for over 180,000 miles, has been wonderful. With three kids, there’s not much else that will carry them without having elbows touch. Heaven forbid they should touch or smell each other. Let’s just say, it makes for a more peaceful journey if everyone has their own space. My husband is ready to trade it in, but I want to make it to 200,000 miles first, which may be at the end of the year. Relating to the 1970 Plymouth Fury you drove, my 17 year old daughter is begging for a 1967 Chevy Impala. I know for sure that her love affair is with the exterior, not realizing the difficulty of driving without power steering and having to hand crank a window down.
Katrina,
You should see a chiropractor. Your spine has gotten out of alignment. The work you are doing is helping but not curing. Trust me, once you find a good chiropractor you will have a different attitude about aging. Get recommendations and be fussy about who you choose. And do it soon.