Our Leased Nanny-Car

 

Kingston.  Headed up to Kingston.  Every three or four months the light in our leased nanny-car lights up, announcing it is time for us to have the car looked at.   The drive out to Buffalo and back, twice, seems to have accelerated things, driven as it is by miles, not time past.  The last car we had in Beijing was a Honda Odyssey.  I never had it tuned up ever.  There were disadvantages.  Certainly, we ran out of wiper fluid only to discover this, when we needed it most.  This time we’re leasing.  So its their asset and the tune up is part of what you’re paying for anyway.

The middle of my morning, I wrote to suggest a meeting which was to start around the time I’d be dropping off the keys at the service-center, should be pushed back till later in the day, only to find that this person I'd be confrencing with, had already written me to cancel.  I headed up Thirty-Two from memory and turned right on 215, and travelled along the Wallkill River underneath 87 and on towards Rifton.  There are some remarkable old building there along the road as one approaches the town.  One that must have been a church has its construction date, something from the nineteenth century displayed prominently on the façade. 

 

The drive through St. Remy up to Kingston is easy enough to follow and there’s a turn the GPS has you do up Hudson Street and over across Spring Street into Kingston proper,  where you head down to Route 9W.  I manage all this without the GPS.  And I know that up ahead I turn left and then, I’m not too sure.  Waze reminds me to take the first right and then its over hill passed a few strip malls to where Prestige Toyota has its lot.  And over the crest of the hill the snow-covered Catskills suddenly announce themselves, off in the distance.  How mighty they look, embarrassing this unfortunate strip of highway. 

 

I’m having a rack put on the car.  I’ve learned to call them: ‘cross bars’ because that’s what the industry term.  But I’m not sure if they’ll be ready.  They are.  And, they warned me that they are recalling some sort of heating pump and will be putting in something new.  They’re gonna give me a rental.  They need my insurance.  I drive out of there with a grey SUV that is decidedly weaker than the one I’m leasing, MY lease.  It feel sorry for this donkey-like steed, as we mount the hill on the way home and consider how enervated this nag feels.   

Monday 03/08/21