I was driving down the road today and drove past something fascinating. Fascinating to me, anyway. I did not have my camera with me. I have a camera phone, but I haven't spent the time to figure out the gadgetry that would send such photos to a useable space. So there's my excuse.
What I saw, next to the garbage cans (it was garbage day) was a toy limousine. It was Barbie size, or maybe smaller. It was white with a pink interior. It had no glass in the windows. I think it was removed in a drive-by shooting.
The car was on the side of the road. Parked there, really. In front of apartment houses, a lone, toy car, waiting for no one, but hoping that, if things changed, its very own chauffer and its very own passengers would come to sit within it and keep it safe from the racing traffic. Poor little limo.
But a big limo? I've little pity for old limousines that seem to be spinning their wheels in the direction of decrepitude. Is this snobbishness? Possibly. But then again, should an item purchased for the purpose of being luxurious and extravagant be expected to age well? Not really. An extravagant home remains extravagant, but only continues to look that way when it is updated and maintained and altered. A car can't be altered--not easily. It will look like what it is, no matter what you do. It might look new and different, but you'll always be able to tell, "Hey, that was a limo under there!"
In college, one of our professors invited us to go to church with her. It was a big church and it was fancy because it was a Baptist church and almost all of the people who went there were (don't tell) black people. They dress up for events such as these. And take the fancy car, I guess.
At any rate, she picked up some of the class in her limo. And I'm a shrew. I thought, "But it's an old one. Why would you keep an old one? Just get a Lincoln Town Car or something. You look silly in an old limousine."
Happily, I don't have to worry about that. As has been pointed out to me by ChillyLily, this lack of being firmly planted in one kind of life affords many opportunities that will be exciting. And, even better, I won't be stuck with an old limousine.
Posted by dotty at June 20, 2005 11:10 PM