I almost lost my teeth last Friday. Provoked by the cruel taunts of friends, I'd been considering giving my car a wash. It had been at least three (maybe seven) years since I'd last sprayed the thing. The grimy build-up, the tumble of seedy carcasses, and the paint from a thousand bird ploppings had become a badge of honor for my 13-year-old Toyota Corolla.
The decision did not come easily. I had enjoyed watching the sooty creep of my exhaust spray as it expanded along the right rear of my bumper. Diagnosed over a year ago as "burning oil", the car looked, according to one giggly colleague, "like it had been through a fire." So why wash it at all? Perhaps it comes in knowing this is my last chance to appreciate the car I have owned since before I married, and before any of my children's lives began. My wife labeled it "a junker" years before I could embrace such a moniker, but once I agreed with her on this, all bets were off and it seemed to amuse me to watch its decline.
The vinyl border around the windows started peeling, I've torn down what I could. The windshield is cracked from a stone that flew up in 2004. My front seat passenger must wait for a valet to open their door as it does not open from the inside. The driver's side door doesn't open from the outside, but now that I've pried off the inner handle, you can grip the mechanical rod through the exposed hole in the door, and pulling it toward the window, release the door. If it doesn't look like rain, I can keep my window down and reach in to open it. And probably worst of all, is the muckety-muck that covers the area between the seats, under the cuprack, and the carpets--no doubt from years of toppled soda cups and coffee splatters.
Its most recent diagnosis was a broken coolant senser (or something like that)--a device that helps the car identify the internal and external temperature. Without it, my engine thinks it's always 30 below zero. Somehow I found a way to pass my Georgia emissions exam this month, and it felt like reason to celebrate with a washing. I wholly expect this to be my car's last year with me, and as we take this victory lap together, I think she should be clean.
