Dear Navy Blue 2000 Ford Focus SE With The Passenger Door Dent In The Hobby Lobby Parking Lot,
I love you. I realize that’s a bit forward, even scandalous
in some circles, to just dive right into the truth of my heart when you don’t
even know me, but I completely lack any censoring abilities pertaining to my
understatedly strong primordial emotions for you at this point.
In fact, I’ll say it again.
I love you.
Let me take a quick step backwards (hardly possible now, I
know) and say that I am NOT a stalker by any means. But the fact that I’m
ever-aware of your presence in said parking lot proves how often I frequent the
craft establishment outside of which you sit, proudly, silently, utterly stoic
until your driver is relieved of his/her shift. The fact that I know your exact
make/model from a distance (I’ve never come within two parking rows of you, I
swear it) merely speaks to the fact that I too was once the proud owner of such
a vehicle; the very same, but in green.
I loved that car.
Perhaps it is the nostalgia that you provoke (such memories
and bitter wounds only six months fresh) that sends me into such a frenzy when
I head to aforementioned craft store, hoping to catch a glimpse of you there in
the lot as I park my car.
Once inside the store however, my focus is dramatically
shifted to the countless distracting delights of such a place (and there are
many, I assure you). I am relieved of any memory of you, or the loss of my own.
But upon exiting those doors, giddy excitement emanating from bags of supplies
I’ve purchased for my next art project, there you are to douse my spirits.
I turn the key in my cobalt blue Kia Rio, attempting to
avert my eyes (I was raised with a proper set of manners; thou shalt not stare,
strange as something may be), but here my manners wane. I climb into my car,
eyes fixed on the navy sheen of your hood, the way light and shadow curve into
that dent in your side. I love you because you remind me of driver’s ed, the
tired plaid shirt I wore when I took my Focus for its first drive, car-pooling
to shows, getting lost everywhere (countless times), moving from home because I
needed space, navigating three new cities and two apartment moves and even
living out of my vehicle for a brief period of time. You remind me of roadtrips
between the house in which I was raised and the home I’d made for myself hours
away; of the growth and pain and tears and sweat (lots of sweat…I went without
A/C in Texas heat for three years). You remind me of me, and some of the most
torrential and beautiful years of my life.
You remind me that six months ago, I had to sell my baby
because it could serve me no more. Perhaps you’re unaware of this, as vehicles
have no capacity for emotion (so I’ve been told), but you never forget your
first love (and I surely will never forget mine).
If you were green, I’d probably cry which would create a
dilemma for my endless requirement of crafting supplies, as this is the only
Hobby Lobby within my locale and you, by association, would have destroyed my
ability to go within a mile of the place, knowing you were there, lurking in
your same spot day after day. We both know I can’t live like that, and something
would have to give. That’s not a threat by any means, I assure you…but thank
goodness you’re not green, for both of our sakes.
So forgive me when I sit in my beautifully air-conditioned
Rio, purchases piled in the seat beside me, key half-poised in the ignition,
lingering a bit longer than I should. Staring, as it were. Thank you for
allowing me to love you from a distance (you have no choice, really) and for
reminding me of the decisions and changes that have brought me to this point in
my life.
With my whole heart, I mean it. Thank you.
Sincerely (but kind of creepily) yours,
Jessica
PS I’d never seen a navy Focus before and I’ve yet to see
one since. You’re one of a kind, my dear. One of kind.
 |
| The day I sold my mean green machine. Look at that crazy supershort-haired redhead! Whata goof. |
