If It Was An Aston Martin, I’d Have Named Him James
His name is Barry White, and I love him. Not typical words you’d hear from a former punk rocker. Strange things happen to me, as you might have gathered from reading some of my columns or my blog, but this has to be about the strangest thing yet—in my automotive history, at least.
But let me back up and give you “the rest of the story,” as Paul Harvey would say.
My 1 Series was involved in a crash—not my fault, and not really the topic of this piece, but nonetheless it had to go in for some reconstructive surgery. During this time, I had no other choice but to throw my automotive mercy at the fine folks over at Hertz. They’ve always taken care of me, but I’d never been in a position where I’d have to play by the insurance company’s rules on what they’d allow me to take as a loaner. “Lamborghini? Sure, sign me up—oh, wait, that’s not covered? Never mind.”
As I mournfully walked into the Hertz rental office, I looked over my shoulder to see what awaited me in the rental lot. Let’s just say that if I liked cars made by Toyota, I’d be in the chips, but alas, I don’t. The kind man at the desk tried to play his hand: “I have you set up with a very nice Camry.”
I shook my head. “No. I don’t want one.”
After bickering back and forth about the “niceness” and “roominess,” he finally figured out that there was no way he was going to talk me into a Camry. But after about fifteen minutes, we did settle on something. I think he found it slightly amusing that I was being such a pill, but I was just busting his chops cause I could. I knew that there was nothing in the lot that would make up for my 1 Series—not anything that my insurance would pay for, anyway.
When I selected my ride of choice, his response was, “Really? You want that?” As soon as I heard that snide comment, I knew that this was the right vehicle for me. Everything about it was weird: It looked weird, it drove weird, weirdness abounded—and it was white, pearl white.
Pulling out of the parking lot, I almost felt like I needed a fake beard and wig to make sure nobody recognized me as “that girl from the CCA.” What would my car-club buddies think if they saw me in this thing? I’d no doubt have my membership card pulled, and I wouldn’t be allowed to sit with the cool kids anymore. My social life could have toppled.
But the opposite happened. The longer I had that silly little car, the more it grew on me. There was all kinds of odd pockets to stash stuff in—pockets within pockets, actually. There was this entire Styrofoam inset in the back that worked as a divider so your stuff wouldn’t slide all around the cargo area. To me, this was just a really big cooler, in which I threw ice and some cold beverages. They kept cold all day, until the issue of getting rid of the melted ice came up; then it got a little, ahem, messy. It worked, though, and I was pleasantly surprised. It also had one of the easiest Bluetooth setups I’ve ever dealt with. That was enough to make me love the car—but then again, it was silly-looking, and it was only a loaner.
I did everything in that loaner. I hauled mulch, went to the mall, tail-gate partied (or my version of it); I even felt so attached to it that when our local Cars ’n’ Coffee event came around, I ran it through the car wash and proudly put it on display. I parked it next to a haggard old Chevy truck of sorts and a mint-green tricked-out Maxima. It looked perfect, and in my eyes, there was no reason such a weird little vehicle didn’t belong right here with the GT3 Porsche and the famous Southern Germanation E36 race car. I strutted around like the proud car-owner I was.
Everything was going great until I ran into my car-club buddies, the ones who know me as The Girl With The 1 Series, the girl who drove across country in a 30-year-old E24 and usually rides her motorcycle when she wants to go fast. My guys already knew about my 1 Series being in the shop, but I didn’t want them to know what my loaner was. When asked, I’d send them teaser pictures of the shift knob or some other obscure piece of the interior. Now I proudly walked them over to my car and presented him. “Guys, this is Barry White, and I love him.”
Jaws dropped and heads were shaken. “So,” somebody asked, “did you name him because of his deep, throaty exhaust?”
“No,” I responded, keeping as straight a face as possible. “It’s white, and it’s a Soul—a Kia Soul! Get it? Barry White? Soul?”
Apparently my sense of humor is too far off for most. Maybe that’s why I actually liked that car: It was weird, just like me.—Nikki Weed
