(formerly)tangentmind.org

My brother currently owns a 1984 Toyota. It has seen it's share of miles and has a broken radiator, a problem that drains the battery, serious problems with the emission system, and a number of other small issues. There's chipping paint, rust, cobwebs in the engine, and a great deal of the plastic interior is faded or sun damaged.

I grew up in this car. To me it's like an old friend. It was bought the year I was born and was the first Camry ever made, in the first year that Toyota sold cars in the US. It's a brown hatch back and the shape always reminded me of a turtle. I probably locked myself in the trunk area a number of times because the back seats folded down. I think I may have known I way to get back out again though. A lot of the faded interior was that way for a great deal of the time that I can remember.

The engine was replaced once. I don't know what happened there. I wrecked it once when I was 3 or 4, because I was impatient while waiting in the church parking lot and I grabbed the gear shifter, which was between the two bucket seats, and pulled back.

Some of my first driving lessons were in that car. My brother has had the car for a long time. He could use a new car; a more family friendly car. I was thinking about whether or not it would be cost effective for me to try to fix it. I would be willing to make all the repairs I could myself. My current car is a gas guzzler, so the benefit would be double the efficiency, give or take. Also, ever since I got my Jeep Cherokee I have wanted a smaller car. I wanted a small car to begin with but a cherokee was kind of one of the cars I idolised as a child. The Toyota isn't a manual, like a would prefer, but that's ok.

Sitting in the car today, it kind of reminded me of going to my elementary school Everything seemed so much smaller and more worn and there was funny smell. Unrelated, they have since remodelled and made it look like a prison.

I don't know where I'm going with this, and I should have gone to sleep 6 hours ago, so I think I'll just leave this subject open ended and incomplete for now.