The end of a six year love affair

Thursday, January 20, 2011, will be something of a sad one for me as I end a friendship that has served me well for around six years.

My loyal friend has been with me through thick and thin and through rain and shine during all that time and has hardly ever let me down.

He (or is it a she, I’ve never quite worked out) has literally been with me on my travels north, south, east and west and together we’ve made great discoveries, met lovely people and seen some wonderful sights.

It seems somewhat cruel therefore to end this beautiful relationship – but the time is right. And that’s because I have my eye on a new and even more attractive model.

For, yes, on Thursday my beloved car and I are to part. And, as it drives off into the sunset, I will have to make acquaintances with a new ‘stranger’ whose affections initially will be based purely on looks.

We all, I suspect, have a relationship of sorts with our cars and in many ways I guess it is entirely understandable. My car for instance has done just shy of 127,000 miles which, if I was to say I did an average of 40 miles an hour means I’ve spent some 3,175 hours in its company. Yes, I have spent fully 133 days behind that wheel. And that, I suspect, means I’ve spent more time with my four wheeled friend as with all of my two-legged ones.

To be honest, I shouldn’t get too sentimental because I am about as far away from being a typical ‘petrol head’ as most men are allowed to be. The choice of my new model saw me agonising more about the colour than the size of the engine and when asked about possible extras, I didn’t think of anything useful that might make the drive more smooth – I just asked about a DAB radio. Oh and a multi CD changer.

However, despite being the sort of car ignoramus that Jeremy Clarkson would look on with distaste (although to be fair I’m not alone – Mr C dislikes about the half the nation for different reasons it seems), when I get a car I’m very loyal to it. And even though I may not treat my ‘motor’ as well as I should, I do always have great affection for it.

Of course my ‘auto-love’ hardly compares with that of other people’s. Some folk treat their cars as almost extra members of the family – feeding them well with the best possible fuel, cleaning them so they always look their Sunday best and even popping them into what I call the junk room (but other people call ‘a garage’) so they don’t get cold at night. Touching really.

So as this new relationship begins I will try to be a bit more like that this time. I will aim to keep my new friend clean inside and out (if so, can someone explain why I chose white as the exterior colour?) and I will treat it with the respect it undoubtedly deserves. Indeed, I might even go as far as doing what some people do and actually give my new friend a name. Of course I really will have to work out its ‘sex’ first. Are cars male or female?

Answers on a postcard .. .