Goodbye car, goodbye imaginary life…

So…I sold my car. Maybe you know, maybe you don’t, but deciding to sell the car and then doing it were both hard and meaningful decisions for me. I have been thinking of selling the car for over a year, but have never been able to let it go…to let go of what it stood for and what it meant to me.

You see, I bought my little car for two reasons. One, because my whole life my family never really had a nice car. When we had a car, which was more often not the case (we learned to love walking J), it was always the kind that had been handed down a number of times over. I am so thankful to have had a car (again, we spent a number of years car-less), but I was a bit embarrassed on more than one occasion for the condition of our cars.  So, when I was old enough to afford my own car, I decided I to buy a car that I was proud to call my own, one that I never had to worry about breaking down, and one that felt new.  That was reason #1 for the car choice – to make up for the past.

Reason #2 was to prepare for the future. At the time I bought it, I was thinking I would be starting a family within a few years. I thought about whether the car would be good for car seats, for hauling strollers, for putting kids in and taking kids out. I thought about road trips and family visits. I thought about whether it would last long enough to be able to pass down to my teenagers. I dreamed about a whole life that would take place with that car…sigh.

About three months ago, a good friend said to me, ‘Beth, that car doesn’t fit you at all.’ At first, I was slightly offended at this, because for so long, I felt that my car was very representative of who I was, of how far I had come in life, of where I was headed. That car fit me perfectly…how could anyone say otherwise? But the more I thought about it and the more I thought about getting rid of it, the more I realized that this friend was right. The car no longer represented me – it represented a life I had imagined, a life I had created in my head, a life that I wasn’t currently living or going to be living anytime soon. With that car, I was living in the future, not the present.

Deciding to sell the car meant accepting that the life I had dreamed about, with a person I had been in love with, was over. Selling the car was an acceptance that I had bought into (quite literally) a life that was never offered to me, never real, never something the other person wanted. Selling the car was an acknowledgment that that life, that dream of a life, was finished with. And that’s what made it a hard thing to do. And why it took me over a year to accomplish.

Over the past year, good friends have helped me heal from wounds I didn’t know existed. Wonderful friends have supported me and listen to me through countless tears. Along the way, my heart has been put back together in a new way. And in the midst of all of it, I have become someone different…because pain changes us. Challenges make us grow. And I think I like the new me. I really love the life I am living, right here, right now.

I am very thankful for a friend who was able to recognize who I am today and where I’m at today, and who spoke up to let me know that I wasn’t living here and now. I am thankful for a friend who continued to encourage me to let go of the past and purse my current life, my current self. I am thankful for a friend who helped me with the actual process of selling the car…because each step was too much for me and never a priority on my to-do list. I am very thankful for this friend.

I find it funny how much I had tied to this little car; that I had allowed it to represent too much in my life, that I had created this idealistic life around it.

Selling the car = freedom. Selling the car = living in the now. Selling the car = new beginnings. Selling the car = possibilities that didn’t exist before.

Tonight I say farewell little car….hello new life.

O, how wonderfully He works in our lives. Thank You for this fresh start.

Selah.

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