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Used Cars
Driving up the South St. Vrain the other day a rock came down and hit the windshield, so my used car is even more used now, and is well on the way to being used up.
We seem to use up cars pretty fast in these parts. A gentleman of my acquaintance has almost used up a nice '84 four wheel drive wagon just commuting.
I guess it's because we live in a remote area. I read that in the Denver papers. When they found a dead guy with a cracked skull near my place, I read that he was found "near Big Owl Road, a remote area of Boulder County." So when you live in a remote area, it's probable that you'll use up cars.
Sometimes it does feel a little remote here, especially just after we've had a couple of feet of snow, but there must be some other reasons why we use up cars. I ought to ask our beloved postmaster, Otto. He has used up a whole group of cars in the last 35 years, just about every way they can be used up. But it's pretty easy to do that in a remote area; into a tree, or a deer, or another car, or a big ditch. Or cars just break, in the area of the axle or the transmission. Then they become used up instead of just used.
After they're used up, often they don't leave. Sometimes people give you used up cars as presents. I had one renter who left me three of them in my front yard.
We have some used up cars, trucks and even busses that have been in one spot so long they're like memorials or landmarks and people are afraid to move them.
Used up vehicles lying around the landscape are probably a part of being so isolated and remote, and there's not much we can do about it. I don't really mind them all that much. Most of the year they're covered by snow, and in the spring it's sort of comforting to drive by places and say, "Yep, there's old so-and-so's place, I see that old pick-up's still in the same old spot." It gives me a feeling of belonging. Makes me feel less remote.
Columns
© 1985 – 2003, David E. Steiner
Allenspark Wind Columns:
Back to the Hilltop Guild Bazaar
The Estes Park Hardware Store [1988]
On the Death of Otto Walter, Postmaster
A Whine About Telephone Service [1991]
On the Death of Charles Eagle Plume
Rumors About a Visit by the Pope
The Visit of Pope John Paul II
Devolutionizing Big Government
The Estes Park Trail-Gazette Columns:
How Old is Charles Eagle Plume?