Black Beauty

We brought home our new car the other day! I shamelessly admit I was quite excited, although I am not really a “car person” under most circumstances. I don’t have the time or inclination to research “Consumer Reports” to find the best automobile for our money. I don’t find joy in pouring over a car manual; memorizing features and accessories. I’d rather read Sue Grafton, frankly. I just don’t care enough about what I drive. All I require is a vehicle that can take me from Point A to Point B safely without making me look like a Beverly Hillbilly. So I let Super Hubs choose the type of car, while I chose the color. (Black, to contrast nicely with my blond hair.)

And my car needs are very simple, really. I do not require remote-start or a sunroof or a Front Seat Bologna-Maker. I just would like a cosmetic mirror so I can apply my Loreal “Bella Donna Mauve” lipstick without mishap, a cup holder to carry my Dr. Pepper, and a CD player to play my subliminal messages of affirmation. (“You’re the tops, Kel.”)

Super Hubs and I have purchased several cars together during our 18-year marriage, and we find that we are amazing as a car-buying team, utilizing well our individual strengths. Super Hubs is adept at doing the research, choosing the car, and negotiating successfully the sale. I am adept at………..well, none of those things. I actually have no car strengths. Not one. Besides my afore-mentioned lack of interest in all things auto, we both know that I would be deplorably bad at car-buying because I happen to have rather large co-dependency issues. I CANNOT SAY NO. EVER. I am a born people-pleaser. Which makes me extremely dangerous when I am in the presence of a car salesman. And carrying my check book. Truly. If the car salesman began feeding me a pathetic story about his grandmother’s upcoming surgery, I’d be handing him my credit cards in the blink of an eye. And agreeing to pay more than the sticker-price.


So, while Super Hubs went to meet with the finance guy, I took Little Squirt by the hand to the Tot-Room, after promising my husband on my mother’s grave that I would not make eye contact with any of the car salesmen, lest I come back with the title to a Grand Velocious Limited, or something. I sat on a tyke-sized chair in the germ-infested Tot-Room for literally an hour and a half, watching the Disney Channel. When I could stand it no longer, I called Super Hubs on my cell phone and hissed, “What in Sam Hill is taking so long?? You are buying a car, not a country!!” He assured me that he was still haggling over the price and various accessories, and the deal would be sealed momentarily. And please be patient and stop calling him. So I waited a little while longer, until I decided I needed to flee the Tot-Room with Little Squirt because a certain child in there was coughing so hard I feared he had SARS.

It turned out that Super Hubs got a great deal on our new car, and I was very proud of him. He was a man with a plan and he stuck firm. Yes, he wanted tires, but not with the package that included the Nuclear Bomb Safety Shield for $900. No, he did not need the Moon Terrain Converter or the While-You-Drive-Pants-Press. Neither did he need to buy the Extended Warranty to cover the extension on the Extended Warranty ‘s Warranty Extension’s Extensive Plan. Yes, he did want windows and a steering wheel. And paint on the car. But not a gauge that reads the Earth’s core temperature and converts it into 40 different languages. Or the In-Car Butler who serves you a sandwich and gives you a neck rub. Just a regular automobile that’ll suit our family’s needs nicely. And is a smidgen sexy.

So now we are a family with two decent, workable cars, once again. And we have a driving-age teenager who guarantees that she’ll be putting lots of mileage on the new car in the upcoming weeks. Which means I will hardly get to drive the new car anyway. I’ll be stuck with the mini-van.