Monday, February 16, 2015

Thank you, Convie

Our 2001 Honda Civic is named Convie.  One Thanksgiving, my generous aunt and uncle surprised me by giving her to us. I took a bus to visit them in Cincinnati and ended up driving her home. Convie’s previous two people were my cousins – one of them called her Connie and one called her Victoria Bouvamonte. We combined the two names, so now she’s Convie.

Convie was awesome during our trip. So reliable, so homey! The only issue we encountered was the driver’s side window refusing to go up, but that was easily resolved. We spent a lot of time driving, but we broke it up (the longest driving day was about nine hours). Convie contained our little world. She not only carried us and our stuff, she protected us and acted as our home-base. 

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We tried to keep things organized…

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I love facing the open road. 
There’s something so liberating about it. 

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Roary is our lion. Niall found him at his old job at a bank. Roary oversaw us from the dash during the whole trip. He is still affixed there.

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We also have Felix the Cat hanging from the rearview mirror. He’s our good luck charm, found while packing, from Niall’s first car.

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For at least the first few weeks, we had a spider hitchhiking along with us. By nightfall, the web would be wiped away, but next thing we knew, there would be a new one built. I think that the snow in Yellowstone was a bit too much for the brave traveler. 

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It’s amazing to think of all the places Convie has been. Through mountains,  busy narrow  city streets, hanging on along Highway 1, in freezing cold and intense heat, getting oil changes in all different cities, filling up with gasoline of all prices all over – high and low and everywhere in-between. When we arrived in Austin, she was covered with dirt and dead bugs and there were crumbs and debris of all sorts inside. We cleaned her up and she kept (and keeps) on truckin’.

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falling rock car

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Being a passenger often lulls me to sleep. Luckily, there's music for Niall, as I'm not the best company.

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Here she is (below), finally parked at our current home after 12,956.2 miles on the road.

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We will forever be grateful to Convie, for all the adventure she’s made possible. In fact, she continues on - she even took us to St. Augustine a couple of days ago for Valentine's Day. 

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