Sometimes...that's just life

Believe it or not, I try hard to be a pretty upbeat and positive person. I have my dark and sardonic moments, sure, but even when life throw's curves at me I still try to see the challenges as something I'm meant to learn from or overcome in this grand journey we're all on.

And then, sometimes, even I let the rough stuff get to me.

The other night, on my way for a night of shopping with a friend, I discovered that my beloved Hedwig had been sick all over the driveway. Hedwig is my loyal and beautiful Ford Taurus, a faithful companion for more than six years. She's had a lot of issues over the past months and all of them have been costly. Despite this, she is still my beautiful and loyal driving companion. We've only recently hit 100,000 miles and I fully expect that with proper care she'll go at least another 100,000 miles. Her recent issues have been things that every car experiences -- we just happen to be experiencing them all at once.

But, as per usual, I digress.

At first, I was unsure of what it was that Hedwig had, frankly, spewed all over the driveway. It smelled like coolant -- in fact, it was the smell that first caught my attention 'else I may not have noticed the darkened pavement beneath her front end -- but it really didn't look like coolant. I'm used to car fluid's being color-coded for ease of identification. Oil is brown, transmission fluid is red, washer fluid is blue and coolant is green. Apparently, coolant doesn't stay green after 100,000 miles (or at least the 70,000 miles I've had Hedwig for -- in which time we've never had a radiator flush).

I will admit that I had a very distressful evening trying to ascertain what was wrong with Hedwig, wondering if she was safe to drive and, if not, what was I supposed to do as a lone female with only a passing knowledge of auto mechanics. I'm very lucky that one of my neighbors was able to stop over and confirm my diagnosis of coolant being the culprit and his estimation that, considering the size of the puddle, it'd be best not to drive.

So, disheartened, I called my friend to say that I wouldn't make it shopping and went inside to feel sorry for myself. Actually, I was still looking for something to throw to vent some of my frustration. I got over both dark feelings pretty quickly and tackeled my filing -- a task I've put off since May, if not before, and desperately needed to be done.

The next morning, when Hedwig was towed (woo hoo AAA!) to O'Donnell's "On-The-Spot" Repair, it was definitely coolant all over the driveway as there was none in the radiator when they took a look.The mechanic working on Hedwig was "mystified" because he could not find any hoses that were cracked/disconnected and there didn't seem to be any leaks in the radiator. When I left the O'Donnell's, they were giving Hedwig a stress test (something about pressure to get the engine hot so they could observe the process through cool-down). During this they discovered that there's a crack in the reservoir and that's where the coolant is spewing from once everything gets all nice and hot and pressurized. Replacing the reservoir was a little more expensive than a busted hose (which is what I was hoping for based on alternatives) but a heck of a lot less than a new radiator.

So, Hedwig and I are back together and things are well. We've got a short road trip planned this weekend that I'm looking forward to. I love a good drive and it's always nice when the two of us can bond on the open road. It gives me time to relax from the things life throws at us. Sometimes, that's just life and we have to deal with it the best we can.