Transportation issues

Soon I talked to my mom about the car issue, as it still was not clear what vehicle I would be using to drive around the country. I figured that like in previous summers, I would be taking the Jeep, except this time putting a good 10,000 miles on it, instead of the usual 1-2,000.  I was pretty pissed when they said I couldn’t take the Jeep since that was the obvious choice and I had pictured it so well that when I found out I wouldn’t be taking it I was pissed to say the least. I didn’t want to vent to my mom as her friend Toby was there, and I didn’t want to embarrass myself by expressing my disappointment. But both of them had a smirk on their face so I knew something was up.  About an hour later, my mom drove me down to a body shop; here I saw a car my parents bought for me – a ’92 Saturn SL2, gray, with 100,000 miles on it.  They got that car for about $100, fixed up a couple minor things and gave it to me as a graduation gift.  This was my first REAL car, one that I didn’t have to borrow or share – my own car. I took care of this car as best I could on the trip, made notes of where I would need to get the oil changed every 3,000 miles, some STP fuel stuff every so often and made it a point to not push the car too hard.

My Uncle Hank was at my Dad’s office when I drove the car a mile there without plates nonetheless. Hank offered to drive me down to the DMV and take care of my registration and the paperwork for the plate as a graduation gift.  Within an hour, I was driving my new car and really excited for the potential of the summer. Any thoughts of taking the Jeep had gone out of my mind as I would much rather take a car of my own.

Hill came to town and things were good and I was so happy she was there.  She was beautiful, more so than I recall from just a month earlier.  We hung out, hiked at Colonie Town Park where I finally got to check on my Eagle Scout Project – marking the trails so that hikers wouldn’t get lost in the Town Park. Hill and I went out here and there, just enjoying each other’s company as she was the first college girlfriend to bring back to Albany without it being in the middle of the semester or for a fleeting night. It was tough to get privacy, but we managed here and there.  For once, I was happy she was with me.  There was always someone else around or school or friends getting in the way of us enjoying each other’s company without anything else distracting me from her. It took a solid nine months but I was happy, that much was for sure.