The Saturn. My friend. My enemy.

If you would have asked me 7 years ago, if I would still be driving my Saturn Vue today – I would have said “heck no!,” or, … something like that, but probably with a few more cuss words inserted. I HATED the Saturn since the day I bought the darn thing. There was a time when I despised it. When I purchased the Saturn, I traded in my (much nicer, fully loaded) Oldsmobile Bravada. At the time, I was convinced that the Bravada was trying to kill me; the gas mileage sucked; it had nearly 100K miles on it. Insert the Saturn Vue. The very practical, non-gas-guzzling, blah-looking mini-SUV; without leather (mind you, I was going through a nearly vegan stage of life). It was the right choice, even if I didn’t want it to be, and my practical side recognized that. So, I bought it. And, I hated it.

A year or so after buying the Saturn, I went through what I would call – a quarter-life crisis. It was really more like a mid-life crisis because I found myself questioning my relationships, my career choices, my failures, my wish-I-wouldas… most quarter life crisis tend to be more focused around an inability to grow up, where my crisis in my 20’s was more focused around the feeling that I perhaps grew up too quickly; a feeling that was heavy on my shoulders – and that darn Saturn represented everything that I hated about myself. Practical. Boring. Sensible. Old. Lacking of power. Responsible. There were days that I contemplated trading it in, regardless of the money I’d lose, test driving cars on my way home from work. Eventually, I decided that I could not just trade in my perfectly-fine-enough car, so I did things like “forget” to change the oil for 12,000 miles. Maybe I would HAVE to trade in the Saturn because it would break down… then it wouldn’t be me being irresponsible, but rather traded in out of necessity.

I felt like I was stuck. Not just with the Saturn, but with my old self.

I finally realized that hating the Saturn would not fix my problems. I needed to fix myself. So… I did. It was like a switch went off one day, and the lights were on. Why did I torture myself so long in the darkness… who knows, but that light was FABULOUS! I changed career focus, from IT to Marketing. I sold my house in the suburbs for one in the city. I let go of past relationship mistakes and learned to love myself again. I realized that I didn’t need to take care of everyone else, but that I needed to take care of me. I learned that people love me for who I am, weaknesses and all; it was ok for people to know that I wasn’t perfect.  I let go of trying to be perfect.  I got another dog, Leto (he has taught me patience). And… I kept driving the Saturn.

Eventually, after coming to terms with myself, I was able to let someone special in my life. Enter Chris. Chris challenged me in ways that I had never been. It may be cheesy to say, but being around him made me want to be a better person. We quickly grew a partnership, and to this day, he keeps me on my toes. We are holding onto that light together, going whatever way it guides us and are celebrating our 3 year anniversary today.

The Saturn has stuck with me through it all. And… I LOVE it! Well, love is a strong word. I’ve LOVED the journey, and ahem… tolerated the Saturn along the way. Even come to have a smidgen of a crush on the thing.

So… you ask, how many more years do you think you will drive the Saturn? Well… it is nearing the 100K mark. Given my 12 mile round trip to work 5 days a week, I anticipate putting about 3,500 miles on it a year. At that rate, minus some life for lack of… ahem… regular maintenance, I figure the Saturn has 4 or 5 years of life left. Maybe more, maybe less, one thing I do know is that it will be all mine for some time to come. I did have a dream where I was driving around in a cute little hybrid… maybe it will be a fully electric car by the time I need a new one.  The point is, when it is time, I will say good-bye to the Saturn because I need a new car, but not because I am unhappy with me.  What a 7 years it has been!