Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Modes of Transportation

We had 2 cars. We are a 5 person family.





These three photos are images of the fine, fine piece of Swedish engineering that we just got rid of. Aforementioned = Success # 4

Why in God's blue & green earth would a family of five sacrifice a gorgeous 1998 Versatile (that's what the V stands for) Volvo V70 T5 Wagon which once belonged to the author's (yes, I spoke in third person right there) mother who took great care to sustain and maintain the fine, fine piece of Swedish engineering?

I'll try to answer - simply first...

We don't need it.

There's definitely a more complicated answer though. The car served its purpose. When we were fixing up our house it made all the sense in the world to have expansive storage space to transport plywood and medicine cabinets and joint compound and shrubbery. But we're done now. And we found ourselves looking at how we used our cars and just realizing it was a great burden (as well as a great luxury) to both have accessibility to our own, personal cars.

Such a first-world problem - to be "burdened" with a fully functioning (and might I mention, FANCY) car. But honestly, that's what I'm figuring out even in the few short weeks down this path. All this stuff is SUFFOCATING. Having things that work and serve their purpose is good. Good for our souls. Good for the thing itself. Watching the old girl sit on the side of the road doing the work that any-old-sedan could do... She was made for more than that.

Volvo's are also tanks and she was guzzling gas at an alarming rate (16 miles a gallon!). Not so great for the environment but a sacrifice needed to finish our home. Just driving her around in the city though... It wasn't working with my conscience.

That's another part of the suffocation I'm talking about. I can't even look at things anymore without thinking about their cost. Not in dollars per se. Let me show you this nightstand so you can see what I'm talking about:



You might see a slightly messy nightstand. What I would have seen on top of the nightstand a few weeks ago were some precious letters, some precious books, a great issue of The New Yorker, some sweet headphones, 2 cups that my sister got for my bachlorette party, a crumply tissue, and the book I'm currently reading buried under everything. Way back then I would have thought that only one thing off of the former list was something destined for the trash. Now I look at the nightstand and all I see is the cost of each thing. The cost in the resources and energy it took to make them all. The cost in the time and energy it takes for me to keep them and maintain them. The cost in terms of what I am choosing by keeping them. And the fact that they will all one day be sent to the trash heap. They will all - one day - go beyond usefulness. What then? The choices I made in buying them will matter then.

I have thought about what it would be like to live with all the trash I created in one year. If I was forced to keep EVERYTHING, what would it look like? It's a scary thought, because I'm not used to being responsible for the things I've thrown away. But I am. I am. I am.

I hope that made you see what I've been thinking about. I'm going to pull us back down from the bird's eye view and spend a little more time on the ground. But don't forget about the way things look up there. It's important. (When I tell you, I'm telling myself too!)

We are going to use some of the money from the sale of the ol' girl to buy me a REAL bike. My bike is a sorry sack of you-know-what whose gears are constantly slipping (for the record I tried to fix it but the dude at Kraynick's said I basically had to deal). I'm sure there is someone who won't mind, when I sell it to them. I just don't want to be worried about my gear's slipping when I'm riding down Negley Ave. I like a relative amount of safety. Call me crazy. Plus, like I said before, I want my stuff to WORK. So since I can't fix it to my standards, it's time for it to find someone who likes it the way it is!

Frankly, I'm looking forward to this part of the experiment. I'm a physical person, who has been stuck sitting indoors for the past five years. I will be sure to let you know whether this was the biggest mistake we've ever made, but like I said before I am under the impression that this was Success #4 (YES! THAT RHYMED!). I am especially looking forward to some saddlebags.

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