'86 Honda Civic, rip

Not fast. Not furious. My wife's 1986 Honda Civic is finding a life with a different owner tonight. She's known this thing longer than she's known me. I think it was about 2 years old when we met. It's got at least 32 horsepower and has never failed to start. Not even on a rainy and cold Monday morning. I thought she should have traded it about a decade ago but she adamantly refused and I eventually adopted it. I began to appreciate it as much as Trish did. I especially liked taking it to the Starbucks parking lot and seeing the Lexus and Infinity owners condescendingly leer at it. Then I'd park next to them, open the door quickly and they immediately realized, they had much more to lose than I. And, we hadn't made a payment on the thing in over 10 years.

My only regret is that each and every ding and bump on it was caused by me. While we lived in Evanston, one Winter it got stuck in 6 inches of ice. Trying to free the little car, I wedged myself between it and someone else's bumper and successfully dented the hood (and did not budge the car). On our way from Evanston to Baltimore, we didn't make it out of Skokie and I had rammed my gargantuan, rented Ford Econoline E-350 cargo van into the Honda's bumper. And some bang on the rear, the origin of which I forget. Sorry little car. When we came to Columbus, it was elderly and we transported it via the bed of a moving van. It will be sold to a mechanic tonight. Around 7. We hope he treats it well. We can only hope the new car lasts as long and sees us through as many fun and challenging times.