Sexy Green Car

I dropped Our Daughter off at school today for driver's ed.

BEWARE!
This kid will be
driving soon.

It's difficult to comprehend she's almost old enough to get her license. I'm not the kind of guy who panics much about the aging process, but that doesn't mean I don't get smacked between the eyes every now and then by the realization I'm fewer years away from being a first time grandfather than I am to being a first time father. Well, at least halfway there, maybe. We'll have to see what the future holds.

Seems like yesterday I was sitting in an auditorium at East Meadow High School on Long Island listening to our two instructors drone on about traffic safety and hoping desperately not to be assigned to the tremendously obese instructor for the actual driving portion of the class. I don't recall his name, but I've never forgotten how he hiked his pants up under his moobs in an attempt to cover his belly. Sure enough, I ended up assigned to his group. Because of his girth, the front bench seat of the driver's ed vehicle had to be rolled all the way back, making it nearly impossible for me to reach the pedals. I have no idea how the short kids in the group even managed to get the car in gear.

That was twenty-eight years ago, and now it's Our Daughter's turn.

She must already be dreaming about that perfect first car. A fashion statement to match her nails and cell phone cover, a status symbol to declare her position in the "Lord of the Flies" pecking order of high school, the purchase of her first car could require countless hours of online research, test drives and color matching. Luckily for her, no such investment of time and energy need be made. The solution to her problem sits safely in our garage.

For years, I've joked with Our Daughter that when the time came for her to drive she would inherit my Toyota Echo. Her response, even when the reality of driving was a far off distant dream?

"No way!"

Admittedly, the Echo is not a sexy car. It's small, stick, and has that odd centered dash that took some getting used too but which I now really enjoy. It didn't come with power steering, a cd player, or even a clock. It could never be a roadtrip party vehicle because there are only two doors, meaning back seat passengers have to climb in and out like clowns at the circus. There are no leather seats, no electric windows or mirror controls. The air-conditioning system is barely more potent than hanging ice cubes from the rearview mirror. And last week it clocked its 190,000th mile. Oh, I almost forgot, the dark green paint job is marred by a decade of attacks by bikes, balls, bats and a battery of assorted childhood weaponry.

But it's been paid off for six years and gets forty miles to the gallon -- city driving! And if she abuses it, forgets to change the oil (as I frequently did with my first car), or chooses to blanket the poor thing with bumper stickers, what's the loss? It's not like the car is a hot classic with collectors clamoring to outbid each other for it. Even Toyota stopped manufacturing it after only a few years and replaced it with the Yaris. The Yaris!!!

And so, Our Daughter has a hard reality to face. Sometimes the liberties of a free society come at a cost. In this case, that cost might very well be a pound of pride paid each morning she pulls that uncontestedly unsexy green car into the high school parking lot.



© 2012 Mark Feggeler

Thread Count Audio

Some people spend big money on car audio systems.

When I was a kid, every other vehicle that cruised down our Long Island street had speakers the size of steamer trunks clogging up the rear dash and reverberating pounding bass at levels loud enough to rattle the rafters. It didn't matter if your car leaked a line of oil down the parkway, or the air conditioner made your car hotter, or the tires were bald, so long as you could treat the neighborhood to some righteous rhthyms.

As we aged, many of us came to understand it isn't the size of our speakers that matters, but rather the quality of their performance. Clarity and range became more meaningful than bombast and wattage. It's now just as important to perceive the tinkling acoustics of guitars and pianos as it is to thrill to the bravado profundo of primitive bass lines and techno-synth drum sequences. Few things have aided the appreciation of a full range of sound than the digital age. Beginning with compact discs in the 1980s all the way up to the latest iTunes downloads, every last sonic detail that goes into the making of a song is discernible for our enjoyment.

Our Toyota Echo didn't have a CD player when we bought it in 2002. It didn't have anti-lock braking, or power steering, or intermittent wipers. Hell, it didn't even have a clock. Thanks to a birthday gift several years ago from my family it has a high-tech radio with USB input for my iPod. The car might not be cool, but it gets forty miles to the gallon and the audio system is awesome.

Our Honda Odyssey, however, relies on a traditional 20th Century audio jack for input to an auxiliary channel. Not as efficient for sound transference, but we made it work until some time last year when the left speaker started cutting out at whim. We replaced the cable connecting the iPod to the stereo and that seemed to do the trick for a while.

Then it started in again, most noticeably during sharp turns to the right, and only with the auxiliary input. I repeatedly checked the cable, searching for kinks in the cord or frayed wires that might be the cause of our trouble. Nothing. I even slapped the dashboard while cursing -- the tried and true method of fixing any car-related trouble -- to no avail.

Normal people would have called the dealership by now. After all, the vehicle is still under warranty. But who has the time for that? Far too efficient, far too effective, and far too sensible.

All technical problems, regardless of venue or importance, require a six-month period of ridiculous home remedies before one should feel justified contacting the condescending geeks at tech support or, in this case, the condescending grease monkeys at the dealership. Our ludicrous solution took advantage of the fact that pressure applied downward on the plug at the console seemed to do the trick. Heavy jackets, sweaters, windbreakers, umbrellas, shopping bags, bits of string. Anything handy that could weigh down the plug and reconnect the signal did the trick.

Gradually, however, heavier and heavier objects were needed. Just a few weeks ago, only the highest thread count materials were sufficient to guarantee a quality audio performance, but I daresay even that no longer is working. Looks like it's time to suck up my pride, stick my tail between my legs, and lie like a rug to the condescending grease monkeys at the dealership.

"The auxiliary jack suddenly stopped working," I'll say.

"Can you describe what it's doing?" they'll ask.

"If you have a heavy sweater I can show you."



© 2011 Mark Feggeler