Good-bye ~ Hello

Today we said good-bye to a faithful member of our family. Sharon and I drove our Geo Prizm down to the Sunline salvage yard on the southwest side this morning. It was a sad moment as I handed the keys and title over, knowing that we would never see our good friend again. More than likely, our '93 Prizm will be crushed flatter than a pancake and sold for salvage metal.

We hoped it wouldn't end this way. It was all so sudden, so final. We brought the Prizm home to our family in 1998. For the past eight years Ryan, Jason, and now Josh and Jon have been driving it to school and around town. We grew to love the little guy. He became part of our family. You can see pictures of him posing with Josh and Jon on the first day of school over the years by clicking on the picture above.

It all began to go south on a Wednesday morning, four fateful weeks ago. Josh and Jon were driving back home after helping serve breakfast at the HD Youth Center. Just as they began to turn left on 74th Street off of C Avenue, another driver pulled out without seeing them and broadsided our car. It was an ugly scene. Paint was scratched, metal was twisted beyond recognition, and critical system functions were disabled. I arrived on the scene shortly before the officer arrived to assess the damage.

I'm happy to say that no one was injured! But our little red Prizm had taken a hard blow, one that it couldn't recover from. It's not that it's health hadn't begun to fail before the accident - the air conditioner didn't work, the heater was not the best, the body had rusted through in several places, and the interior roof upholstery was sagging. The boys nursed the car back home, where we looked over the damage.

Subsequent discussions with specialists confirmed our fears that the injuries were fatal - the car was totaled! It was still driveable, but just barely. The boys got quite a few comments and glances when they drove down the road with the limping Prizm. We knew what we had to do. We needed to find another used car for our family.

With a rather generous insurance adjustment, I began our quest for a new family member. Ryan and Natalie's wedding and Thanksgiving put our plans on hold for several weeks. Finally on Monday, we found our new little compact in Coralville, a 2001 Nissan Sentra. It's mileage is rather high, but everything else checked out great. Josh drove down with me on Wednesday to pick it up.

Which brings us to today. I felt a small twinge of sadness as we drove away from Sunline this morning. Our Prizm has served us well. But as we drove away in our new Sentra, enjoying the nice sound system, the good heater and great road handling, my regret quickly turned to relief. After all, we were only leaving a car at the salvage yard, not a member of our family! And God had provided a new car for us. One, that by His grace, will provide us with many years of service and wonderful memories.

Today was a good day. Today we said good-bye to our old Prizm and hello to our new Sentra.