Car Trouble

Sometimes the things we get most worked up about turn out to be a drop in the ocean and unimportant anyway.

The renewal notice for my car breakdown insurance appears through the letterbox and a feeling of dread stirs within.

Every year it’s the same.

They put up the premiums astronomically, presumably to subsidise the excellent offers they make to new members, I call them up and tell them I’m not having it, we go back and forth for twenty minutes, and they end up giving me a discount.

“Can’t we cut to the chase this year? We all know how this plays out,” I ask the polite lady on the other end of the phone, who could be from Newcastle.

She ignores me.

“Are you happy with the cover you’re receiving?”

“Yes, I’m just not happy with the price.”

“Your premium does include our key insurance in case you ever lose your keys.”

“I’m anal about keys. I’m probably the customer least likely to lose keys.”

“The price you are seeing on the website is just for new customers.”

“Well OK, I’ll leave today and rejoin tomorrow.”

We eventually finish the call after I’ve paid a bit more than last year but not so much that I am prepared to go through the hassle of leaving and rejoining.

The next day, when the suspension has dropped so far on my rear wheels that it looks as if I am entering a real-life version of “Whacky Races”, I wonder if the breakdown insurance company arranges “hits” on customers they want to punish.

At the garage, they identify the issue and tell me what it’s going to cost.

I work out how many years of breakdown insurance I could buy for the money.

It’s hot at lunchtime while I’m putting the dogs in the back of my wife’s sports car. They look at me with disdain as they squeeze together on the back seat.

Daisy dribbles on my shoulder as we press along the motorway making a point that doesn’t need making.

I get a text from my daughter who has been looking at cars since we agreed to buy her one for her 21st birthday.

“How much did we pay for yours?” I ask my son.

He tells me and I am a bit surprised.

“That was generous of us.”

“Try and see it as a good investment,” he replies, and I think about the kit I bought him many years ago to make t-shirts which cost me £200 that I’ll never see again, how I didn’t even get a t-shirt from it, and what his definition of a good investment is.

“I’ve found some I like,” my daughter says.

I look through the list and they are all the same make, same model, and colour.

“Shall we buy this one?” I ask her

“I don’t know. It stresses me out because I don’t know anything about cars.”

“You’ve narrowed down the options by choosing half a dozen identical ones.”

“At least I’ll be able to put fuel in it,” she says as she prepares for her first day in a new part-time job.

I think back to my son’s comment about “good investment” and the journey we took together to look at his car, our conversations on the way there and back, how much joy and freedom the car has given him, and how it’s a part of our relationship I always think about with fondness.

“Can you give me a lift to work? I’m going to be late,” my daughter calls out, halfway through the door.

“Yes OK, I just need to find my keys.”