When I was 16, I was awarded my first taste of freedom.. a 1988 Pontiac Bonneville.  It was gray, with bucket seats and a cassette player, and it had a few nicknames: Bonnie, the Gray Ghost, and It’s Still Running?.  Although some of my friends had smaller, cooler cars, I loved my Bonneville.  It let me fit fifteen people in it, and had an engine that would rival my friends’ “sportscars”.  You think you’re all that with your V6?  Bring it.  I had a V8, baby. 

I took my Bonneville with me to Louisiana.  In fact, it moved me to LA.  I packed up all of my earthly belongings (with room to spare, I might add) and took them on with me.  My Bonneville became a joke at the station: high class dame in a low-class car.  But I still loved it.  It was an old friend.  My car was well-loved.  The bench-style front-seat had a “notch in the headboard” type quality to it.  The wet wipes in the back was an old joke.  And yes, I ALWAYS had a roll of toilet paper in my car.  You just never know..

A few months after my 20th birthday, I was showing Nathan around town.  He had come down from Shreveport for the weekend, and I was trying my best to make my itty bitty town as big as his casino town.  I was making a left hand turn from McArthur to Texas Ave when my car stopped.  In the middle of the intersection.  We hopped out and pushed it to the corner gas station where it became official: After 200,000 miles, Bonnie had died.

Bonnie started just long enough for me to coast into the radio station.  There had been a car dealer that frequented the r&b station next door, and he had quite a taste for Trinity (moi).  I got his number from Married Guy and worked my magic.  “Come in after your shift,” he said.  “I’ll have a car waiting for you.”

We towed Bonnie into the dealership; I was slightly inconsolable.  I was in a strange city, with a new job, and making $15K a year.  Oh, yeah, and my one collateral was now dead.  I had worn my lowest-cut shirt, but nothing made me feel better. 

I’ve been trying for two days to remember that man’s name.  Lamond?  Maybe?  Lamanuel?  Something.

Either way, I remember him asking me if my hair was weave.  And when I said no, he said, “Wow.  That’s unbe-weavable.”

Ha.

Anyway, the man brought out this (at the time) 2 year old Mustang.  It was green.  He said that was the only car that he would finance me for.  And because I was stupid, carless, and upset that he thought I had weave in my head, I said, “Yeah, okay.”

I HATED that damn car.  I have driven that POS for five years now, and there is not a day that I don’t regret that car.  I felt sexy in it for about, oh, a week, and after that, it started dying on me.  The CD player would randomly decide to eat CDs.  The car ate its own tires.  It would flip a coin daily to decide if it felt like actually transitioning into third gear or just skipping it entirely.  Not to mention the fact that, should more than one person want to ride with me, someone would have to contort their body into a bean-like shape.

To its credit, the poonstang (the ONLY nickname it ever got that I can recite on here without FCC censorship) DID haul a UHaul trailer back home from Louisiana.  I’ve never seen another Mustang tow anything, and you should’ve seen the faces of the men as I pulled up for them to install a trailer hitch on the back of my sportscar.

About two months ago, I drove The Boy to a baseball game.  It was a conundrum to get him into the two-seater to begin with, but he was just about to work my last nerve by vibrating his chest while we were driving.  You know that noise.. where you pound your chest while sounding an open vowel.  I was turning around to light into him when I realized.. he wasn’t pounding anything.  My alignment was just SO bad in that damn car that you could open your jaw and it would force a vibrato on your voice.

(Disclaimer: there were times when this strong vibration was tolerable.  But we won’t talk about that here.  BUT YOU KNOW.)

Yesterday, the Poonstang began his death throes: it wouldn’t accelerate.  I could get to about 60, and then, around lunch, less than 60.  I know these whirrrrs well.. it does not bode well.

So I went shopping.  I did a bit of research.  And yes, ladies and gentlemen, I have done the impossible.

I bring you.. SARAH’S NEW CAR!!

(And K.. you inspired a personalized license plate.)