Ok, as Americans, pretty much everybody owns a car or three. It is part of our culture and particularly for those of us on the West Coast, our infrastructure is set up for driving.
Everyone has had "car trouble" at some point. I know I have...and as a matter of fact, am right now. But, as I sit here waiting for the tow truck, it occured to me that is it really car trouble? Cars aren't alive, they can't cause trouble. They work until something breaks, which it will. Everything breaks down at some point.
In our society, when a car breaks down, we get ticked at the car. We curse it out, blame it for causing so much trouble, making us late, inconveniencing US! The nerve of that fairly complex, human designed, human operated inanimate object, to ruin OUR day!
My car is 9 years old and has about 135,000 miles on it. I am the only owner, ordered it from the factory in November of 1999, shortly after my oldest child was born. It broke down this morning, just wouldn't start. My oldest child is in 3rd grade. Pretty good run I think.
I looked through my service records and figured that I've spent about $2000 in repair work over the life of the car. Roughly $225 a year. It was a company car that I then bought from the company about 5 years ago. So that makes it about $400 or so a year since I've owned it. That is a car payment of $33 a month.
My car doesn't cause me problems, it gets me where I need to go day in and day out. It has officially "stranded" me 3 times in 9 years, for a total inconvenience factor of about 9 days. That means it has worked 364 days a year, all for the bargain price of $33 a month. I spend more on Starbucks and it has never taken me anywhere.
Celebrate your car, change the oil regularly, drive as little as you can.
JReed...Says Be Well.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment