Well, folks, it's a big day here at The Wilder Things. First of all because Rosie the dog went to the car place to get my mom's tires fixed with her, and secondly, because it's the first guest post on the blog! The guest blogger today is
Deborah Weisgall (aka my mother) who has written for many major publications, including
The Atlantic Monthly, Esquire, Fortune, The New Yorker, and especially
The New York Times. She is the author of three books, and is in talks for her fourth. And speaking of car places, I present to you:
Size Matters (On Buying a Car)
By Deborah Weisgall
My first cars were Porsches.
They were cramped and loud. Driving
them, I flew. We—the car and I— were
both a little bad. I drove too
fast. On the interstate I raced anybody
who asked; I turned back roads into roller coasters. I could pry the dog into the back seat, maybe
the cat, but certainly not the baby, too.
I rarely drove the last one, a beautiful Targa with oxblood leather
seats. When I discovered the mouse
skeleton inside the sleeve of the gearshift, it was clear that it was time to
give it up. A colleague of my husband
bought it and races it. I can’t get it
out of my head.
So I bristle when the BMW salesman says: “You don’t want
manual transmission.” It’s not a
question.
“I do want manual transmission,” I tell him, “but it isn’t
practical, all that sitting in traffic.
And do you know what a clutch does to the backs of heels?”
He looks at me, uncomprehending.
“High heels,” I say.
“Scuffs them. It’s not pretty.”
He nods; he gets it.
I’m a bimbette; I want looks, not guts.
“Then you don’t need the bigger engine—I mean, it’s an option.”
I smile. There’s
something kind of sweet and hopeless about it; he’s giving me what he thinks
women want. He assumes that cars are not
my thing, that guys are the ones who kick tires, who fantasize about 0 to 60 in
a nanosecond, who appreciate a snarling grill and tight steering.
“The car I drive now is a bit underpowered,” I say. “It’s a 325 wagon. I have to throw it around to get it to do
what I want. When I bought it, you had
to go to Germany to get a wagon with a bigger engine. 328 is better. Even bigger would be better.” The salesman gives me a worried look as he
takes my license to photocopy.
And I really want a Porsche, I think, but I really need a
back seat. I want a small car, fast and
nimble, that can blow away any other car on the road, carry passengers,
animals, and my baggage, psychic and otherwise—and one that has a place for me
to put my pocketbook. When I think about cars, I’m a mess of contradictions.
“But where can you drive a Porsche, I mean, really drive it?”
my husband asks. “You’ll get caught for
speeding. And all those guys will want
to race you.”
“So?”
“It’s dangerous.”
After a couple of decades of marriage, you know when not to
respond.
I ask the salesman to find me a road full of potholes—my
current car is tricked out with M series amenities like performance tires and
tight suspension. It rattles like a
stage coach in the Mojave whenever I venture off a perfectly paved road, which
in New England by March does not exist. I’ve
had the rims on this car straightened a couple of times, and loading snow tires
in the trunk is no fun, and why spend half the year without those sexy chrome
spokes?
I know, I know. I could
drive a Cayenne. Porsche, I guess, designed
that car for what women like me want (or what they think women like me want)—or
for their husbands, for those occasions when they have to schlep the kids. A family Porsche? The Cayenne is more like a Lutheran hymn—A
Mighty Fortress—on wheels. The car looks
like a Neolithic fertility goddess, all those high, fat curves: big tires, big
boobs, big butt. It’s a Teutonic Dolly
Parton, which translates into Brunhilde.
Not for me. I love the music,
hate the myth.
And then there’s the Panamera—gorgeous in pictures. Four doors: this could be it. I go take a look. What can I say? There’s a famous passage in one of the first
mystery novels ever written, when the hero walks into a house and sees a woman
standing at a window. She’s slender,
she’s small, she’s perfect. And then she
turns around—and she’s ugly. That’s the
Panemara. Except that the woman turns
out to be the real heroine—and maybe the truth is that the Panamera is a little
out of reach.
I try an X3. My
husband is all for it. Yes, it’s roomy; yes,
it bounces happily over potholes. But
the new ones are bulbous, wider than the sexy, scrappy, Jeep-like first version. They know who buys those Cayennes, and this
is a Cayenne wannabe. You probably can’t
even get a standard shift. Is this who I
should be?
An X5 is huge, out of the question. A Series 1 convertible. Totally adorable. The dog would just make it in the back seat, or
the occasional unhappy passenger. I open
the trunk—and there is none; it’s filled with the retractable roof mechanism. If I’m going to do that, I can do better. A 6 series convertible? Too big, no room even in that trunk, though I
love the little parking place finder, sort of like always having my mother and
her parking karma with me.
But there’s something about all these cars that isn’t
authentic, or vaguely inappropriate, like a guy wearing a Speedo who shouldn’t
be. A lot of them feel like responses to
focus groups. They’re full of features
to make people happy, and they seem like compromises. I’m not a man having a midlife crisis. I want a car that’s sure of itself, that understands
its purpose, that’s tough, that’s honest. And I have to admit it; I’ve been happy with
my Series 3 wagon. So I won’t get the M
trim and tires this time around. The car
does what I want it to do.
But what is that? Doubts
again. Our daughter has her own car now;
she’s an adult. How much baggage to I
really have? How much do I need? How safe do I want to be? Mostly I throw my pocketbook on the passenger
seat. What do I really want? Holy
mackerel, I think, I am having a crisis. I do have a lot of baggage; I load all kinds
of things into my car: skis, groceries, paintings, dog food, the dog, the cat,
a kayak, my daughter, my husband, often both at the same time. This is good; it translates into pleasure,
connections, love. And for all those
reasons, I want to be safe.
That night, I’m reading a John Le Carre thriller with a car
chase. There’s BMW in it, an old one, a
2002. The car does okay. It keeps the hero alive at high speeds over
some seriously rutted Swiss cow paths.
My 3 would do the same; it would lay down its life for me,
no question. It’s not showy. But it’s sleek, it’s fast, it’s smooth; even
with automatic transmission it handles like a sports car; it holds enough. It’s just right. It fits me, who I really am, what I really
like. What was I trying to prove? I’ll get the new one in Deep Blue Sea. I turn off the light and sigh.
“What is it?” My husband rolls towards me.
“Nothing. Just life.”
“Do you really want a Porsche?” he asks, apprehensive.
“No,” I say. “I’m
happy with what I have.”
He sighs with relief.
“I was worried,” he says.
