A Farewell to Cars

The longest love affair of my life might be over.

by David Faris

When I was a 5-year-old in the back seat of a neon-blue '81 Plymouth Reliant visiting my mom's family in Kentucky, one of my favorite things to do was to identify the makes and models of cars. Teasing out the difference between Plymouths and Dodges based on their taillights was a parlor game for me and my brother as we tried to pass time on the 14-hour drive. At home I had a box full of Matchbox Porsches and Chevys, an electric race car set and a remote-control Ferrari. I fell asleep to the hum of cars passing by my windows.

I pretty much loved anything with four wheels and an engine, from my dad's '68 Oldsmobile to my cousin's dusty Toyota pickup truck. Like many American teenagers, the crowning moment of my adolescence came when my parents plopped the keys to a car — a '78 Plymouth Volare — in my hands and told me I could drive it around without them in the passenger seat. Passing my driver's test was as important a rite of passage as any debutante's ball or bar mitzvah.

The idea of not owning a car was as bizarre to me as living in a nudist colony, voting Republican or eating broiled kittens for dinner. I occasionally met people my age who had not bothered to get their licenses and I always treated them like they were lost souls who had wandered in from the 14th century and didn't understand the modern world. Did they know about indoor plumbing?

But over the years my ardor for the automobile started to wane. First it was the stack of repair bills that accumulated in the glove compartment of my '92 Buick LeSabre. Sure, it was nice to be able to jump into my car and fill it with groceries, but was it really worth a 10th of my meager grad-student income?

It was only recently, though, that I realized my lifelong love affair with the automobile was pretty much over. Spending more than $50 to fill the tank of my aging Buick the other day, I took stock of exactly what I needed the car for in the first place and couldn't come up with anything other than a bit of selfish convenience. The ever-climbing price of gas, the reality of finite petroleum supplies and my desire to be in a big city were all conspiring to take the keys away from me.

I can get from my apartment in West Philly to pretty much anywhere in greater Philadelphia from the trolley or regional rail. The occasional Trader Joe's runs can be covered by Philly CarShare. For the piles of cash that I throw away on insurance and repairs, I could buy myself a shiny new commuter bike to get me anywhere in the city from March to November and have enough money left over for a case of Yards and a weekly dinner at the Dock Street Brewery.

The trouble with cars is that the amount of energy and money it takes to move a single human being around in a personal, four-wheeled metal chariot is astronomical, and completely unsustainable in the absence of some new way to turn the wheels. And as much as I may like the idea of cars, the reality is that when my Buick dies I may never buy another one. I may become one of those bike-crazy city people I used to chuckle at when I was in high school.

Today I wake up, against my will, to the sound of cars puålling away from the four-way stop outside my bedroom window. I can't say I'll miss driving, or sitting in traffic jams and banging my head against the steering wheel. But you never forget your first love, and I'll miss being in love with cars.

David Faris is a frequent Slant contributor. To respond to his, or write one of your own, e-mail bhoward@citypaper.net.