Kathy and I are celebrating an interesting two-week anniversary.  It was two weeks ago today that Kathy and I sold my Honda and bought a second Santa Fe.  What was momentous about the transaction is that,  for the first time in our married lives, we do not own “his” and “hers” vehicles. They are both “ours.”  And the one and only reason for that is my insurmountable urge to turn whatever vehicle I own into a compost pile on wheels.  It’s been like that for as long as I can remember, despite my earnest efforts to change and Kathy’s fervent sermons on the topic – and if anything the car messes have gotten worse over time.  (By the time we sold my Honda it was so filled with stuff that you couldn’t see a single square inch of the floor or seats – and by the time we had emptied it out,  we had basically filled half of our garage.  It was the equivalent of one of those circus clown cars where twelve men pile out of one little vehicle – except that out of my little car came four bags of garbage, and eight boxes of important stuff.   (Trust me- it really was important stuff.)

So with the purchase of our new vehicle (which is actually a lightly used vehicle) comes a complete reboot in which we swap our two vehicles back and forth on an almost daily basis: no more mine, no more yours, only ours.   And although it’s a bit premature for me to be claiming a lifestyle change after a mere fourteen days, I gotta say that I have never cleaned up after myself in a vehicle like I have over these two weeks.  Because when I get out of the blue car at the end of the day,  I know that Kathy will be climbing into that same blue car the next morning-  and that’s all the motivation I need to pick up after myself.  It’s as simple as that-  and how two college graduates (one with a masters degree,  and the other one of the most practical people I’ve ever known) didn’t figure this out a long long time ago I can’t fathom.

And there’s a bigger lesson here too, although I don’t have it fully unravelled yet. But it has to do with how differently we might view the planet and the place we live – and the places where other people live- if we were engaged in a similar game of swap-and-share on a much wider scale and viewing this where we find ourselves on this planet as “our” rather than “mine” and “ours.”   My suspicion that things would be so much better for so many more people instead of being very good for the select few lucky enough to be born in the right corner of the planet.

But that’s another matter for another day.  Right now,  I’m just reveling in the delight of having a clean car for the first time in my life. . .  which feels a little like a scoliosis patient shedding their back brace for the first time.   I am grateful for the XM-Sirius radio in our new vehicle, which – on those days when I’m driving it – allows me to listen to classic Metropolitan Opera broadcasts.  (Nothing makes me feel like King Of The Road like listening to Zinka Milanov singing La Forza del Destino!)   And while we’re counting blessings, I am very thankful indeed that when I drove our new car to Madison the Saturday after Easter,  I was not involved in a serious accident which unfolded right before my eyes on Madison’s busy belt line highway- when the car driving right in front of me swerved recklessly, went out of control, and slammed into the concrete median.   I drove the rest of the way back to Racine with my eyes fixed on the road ahead of me with my hands at 10:00 and 2:00 on the steering wheel.

Because I would have hated for anything bad to happen to our car.

pictured above:  our two Santa Fe’s