Everyone is so eager to capture the whispers and share the traumas of haunted buildings – whether there are actual ghosts there or not. There is always history there. There is a stationary grandeur to the steadfastness of the structure. Yet, with the exception of a notably possessed 1958 Plymouth Fury, there aren’t many murmurings about the spirits of the vehicles we drive. Did you know one of the terms for where your broken, abandoned, or old vehicles are deposited, sometimes in an effort to be recycled, salvaged for parts, or, sadly, left to decay, is called a vehicle boneyard? In modern days, we usually call these junk yards or salvage yards, but aside from that, it is a place where these vehicles are naturalized, much like our own graveyards for people or what we try to do for our bodies that our souls have left behind. And we try to repurpose the physical form (naturalization and donors), or reincarnate them (tree graves), just like we do with the unmanned vehicles.
To which I then ask, why is it wrong to mourn the loss of your car, when history reveals these thematic connections to the passing of our own physical form? When I lost my last car, it felt more like losing a friend than losing a four-wheeled heap of transportive metal. It was shocking to be shamed for my feelings, but I suspect I’m far from alone in feeling this way.
As you’ve probably guessed, this Eulogy is not for a person. My Eulogy is for something that filled my soul the moment I met them: my 2018 Caspian Blue Nissan Rogue.
How did we find each other? On New Years Eve Day 2019, my family had been out to a movie, as it had been a safer part of the lockdown and easy to stay distanced at the theater. We were going through a typical roundabout when all of a sudden, we were t-boned by a truck. It was a pretty rough accident and traumatic for my daughter. The passenger side door and in-between took the brunt of the hit, with my husband being the primary victim, but my daughter had never been in an accident and was only 9-years-old at the time. We were in our beautiful blue Chrysler 300. That frame, though, truly did save my husband and daughter from severe injury. Despite the severity of the hit, massive amounts of shattering glass, and being pushed a decent distance, there were no airbags deployed. But nonetheless, the car was, honestly, totaled. We could still drive it, with a window wide open, but the body damage was so severe, my husband had to crawl out the driver’s side. It was a rough task. My husband really loved the 300 and, I might add, it had a HEMI, which purred gorgeously. She, and I gender the car purely based on the vibe I had with the car, was a powerful and gentle car, that made you feel special being in her. The lightly tinted windows and the cushy leather seats made this car feel extra lux. But, honestly, I never named her. She was always just known as The 300. That was her name. In the wake of the accident, I was exceptionally sad to learn that she was totaled, but I also could see how much damage there was and that it was the right call.
With the fate of The 300 decided, we had to go about the process of finding a new car as soon as possible. Since I was the primary driver, I suggested we finally look into getting an SUV to handle the increasingly difficult weather we were experiencing in Wisconsin. While the 300 was nice for empowered freeway driving, if our Condo Association plow didn’t plow our driveway in time for me to get to work, I was screwed getting that 300 through the snow in the driveway and the city plow pileup blocking the side street. The exciting prize you received if you did try to get out was that you became stuck. You weren’t getting out without extensive help, which I didn’t have when it happened to me. One morning when I got stuck in the snow, my neighbor, who was leaving as well, pulled up alongside me and rolled down his window. He took a look at the scene and said “that sucks” and drove his JEEP around me and off he went on his merry way. I think it’s clear from that one scenario alone that I very much wanted something that had a bit more clearance.
A rental was required while we waited for insurance to settle and while we looked for our new vehicle. We were given a Nissan Rogue by the rental company. Unbeknownst to us, it was everything I wanted. I couldn’t believe how right-fit the experience was and driving it, while it may not have had a HEMI, was still a joy! I am also a sucker for Star Wars references and Rogue One is a favorite story of mine. I started fantasizing about getting Star Wars stickers for the back of the vehicle or even figuring out how to make a custom license plate that would be punchy for the car. I’d always wanted a personalized plate, but never felt ballsy enough to have one. I wanted a Hootie and the Blowfish one when I was a teenager. And now the old inspiration came back with the Rogue. (Note: I didn’t get a personalized plate.) I’d never been this passionate and excited about a car before. And after Ray hunted, he found our perfect match in Illinois. He went to pick it up and bring the Rogue back home to Northeastern Wisconsin.
I didn’t name my Rogue right away. I don’t typically name my cars. As much as I love them and show adoration for them, especially my very first car – a 1992 Oldsmobile Toronado – names just didn’t seem important. Some affections ran deeper than others, especially once I had the opportunity to pick out and purchase my own car.
Previous cars had been purchased hand-me-downs from my parents or grandparents. The first car I actually picked out and purchased for myself was my blue, chrome package 2004 PT Cruiser. My parents raised hell over it being a stupid car, but when I left it with them when I moved to Scotland in 2007, they fell in love with driving it. When we moved back home, my husband was driving it for work on our daughter’s first birthday and someone rear-ended him. The insurance company decided it was totaled. This is where I first learned about the scam of assessing a vehicle as totaled and how you’d be punished if you didn’t accept the insurance company’s offer. Our PT Cruiser was a limited edition 2004 chrome package. You couldn’t get it anymore or easily replace it and we definitely didn’t get a good value for it from the insurance or the settlement. I was devastated and felt my first true heartache at having lost a car. I had always thought “totaled” meant genuinely, severely damaged– not just more expensive to repair than the insurance company feels is worth it.
By the time 2020 rolled around and I got the brand new Rogue, I was starting to take steps into a new era for myself. While the ultimate low wouldn’t come until 2023, I was starting to feel the effects of having lost myself. I didn’t know who I was anymore, because I was spending so much of my efforts helping to take care of my mom, my incarcerated brother, my husband and daughter, my home, and, for a time, my job as a middle school teacher. The only space I could really call my own, recharge quietly, and feel better was in my car driving to and from places. My Rogue made me feel safe and I treated her with love and care. She became my safe place.
In October 2024, I prepared for a trip that would take me out of my comfort zone and launch me into a Sagittarian’s dreamworld! I planned a 2 week road trip along the East Coast stopping at places that felt very YOLO to me, in case I never made it back that way again. I was going to Cleveland, Buffalo, Niagara Falls, Saratoga Springs, Salem, Bangor, Mount Washington, Gettysburg, and a visit to the Warren House and filming locations for The Blair Witch Project. It was a dream road trip that I knew, in my heart, soul, and mind needed to happen to put me on the path out of the darkness. I was going to travel with my furry friend, Mr. Logan, and I needed to make sure my vehicle was optimized for the comforts of a life on the road. I bought a wheel cover that had different textures on it to help with my road anxiety (reduce flipping people off). I installed my crystals and evil eye decor to inspire safety for myself and my passenger. I found the most adorable Pedro Pascal air freshener, because whose day isn’t perked up by a little Pascal smile. I added a garbage bag holder and had the cigarette lighter plug/usb adaptor so I could plug things in and charge them. I even made sure I had a great dog space and a special harness to keep him hooked safely in the seat next to me. Essentially, I customized the car for this trip. I made it even more my safe space than it was before. I made it my home on wheels. I just wouldn’t be sleeping in it, even though if an emergency arose where I would need to, I could because I got a Starry, Starry Night windshield blind!
This all might seem eccentric, but I hadn’t road tripped alone since the early 2000s. This was 20-25 years later! I’m now forty and plus-sized and my social anxiety is in the red. I was a woman traveling alone in the wake of a heated election and I didn’t know what to expect of the climate while I traveled. At the time I left on Wednesday, November 6, the results had just been reported. I couldn’t cancel the trip out of safety concerns now. So after everything was prepared, Mr. Logan and I loaded into my Rogue and were off to discover a world I’d only had glimpses of in the past.
This trip was a profound awakening of the soul. It provided a great many opportunities for self-reflection. As I drove the freeways and side roads and back roads to the Northeast corner of the United States, I felt like I was in a new world and with each stop I made I learned something new. I was on a mission to get from point A to point B, but I felt carefree. I only had to worry about me and my dog.
“Begin at the beginning, and go on till you come to the end: then stop.”
And as I traveled, the words of Lewis Carroll from his most revered work came into my head: “If you don’t know where you are going, any road can take you there.” It was this mindset I decided to adopt on a day-to-day basis even if I did, in fact, know where each day’s eventual final destination might be. It was here that I realized my Rogue’s name was Alice. We were traveling in a world of fantasy and mystery and confusion – falling down the rabbit hole to the places in my dreams and in the stories I’d read. We were off on an adventure and this was magic. But not just this adventure, there have been countless adventures since that November in 2024 and each one was more special than the last. New challenges were always faced head on together, no matter where we were.
Like Alice in Wonderland, she was my steady presence in a confusing world—I felt safe with her. She protected me from the terrors of the road: general bad drivers, cars spinning out in a January blizzard on 80W, semis almost tipping right in front of us in a massive windstorm, paved roads becoming off-roading pothole detours, driving up and down twisting mountain passes in Colorado, torrential rainstorms that felt like driving into a lake, and going down an iced road with 75% incline and a river at the bottom (thanks GoogleMaps) to name a few. She never failed me.
Then came a drive home from Ohio this past March and an unforgiving patch of black ice. Even in the end, I knew she couldn’t find traction once we started sliding and we used what we could to stop as safely as possible. I came away with minor injuries, but she gave everything to help me stay safe and the insurance company used that word “totaled” and made the decision for me to “put her down.”
I know that sounds dramatic, but I always reflect on how people think of their house. The place they MADE a home. My car… my Alice… she was a home to me. 90,000 miles in only 5 years. She helped me find the joy in my life that I needed in order to pull out of the darkness my path had left me in. And the space I had created for myself made it very personal. I connected with her. Like I know where all the creaks in the steps are going up my stairs in my house, I knew where her little creaks were. I knew how this worked and what that meant and could feel the subtle shifts.
Alice was personified by me. I understand that. Humans are constantly seeking human connection in living and nonliving things (Pixar much?). We personify or anthropomorphise them to connect with them. For example, when I was in a private religious college, there were always these debates about whether animals have souls and go to heaven. The argument from many (who didn’t have pets) was that they were beasts placed on this Earth for us to use to serve “Him”. When they die, it is like anything breaking and becoming “useless.” Another argument was that we personify our pets, giving them a fake soul by seeing emotions and feelings in their eyes, but that they are purely acting on instinct and do not possess a moral compass. That, of course, begged the question “is our soul just a moral compass”? That’s not a debate for today. But the final argument was that in loving them, as love is the greatest gift God gave man, we give them a soul as they were meant for more than just the role of an animal in God’s garden. That one is also hard to accept, because we are mere mortals, not givers of souls. An interesting discussion was once sparked by the idea that animals are born with souls and those souls are ignited through love. I had a friend at the time who was viciously opposed to any sentiment towards animals, to the point where she thought it was helpful to tell me my pet I lost was just serving its purpose and I should just move on. But that feeling I felt when she said that, while not as strong as the hurt I felt for the loss of my cat, was how I felt about my car and when others treated me like I was being absurd for having those feelings. It made me think of how hurt I felt by my friend treating my pet like they didn’t matter beyond being a bag of fur-covered bones.
Maybe my love and attachment to Alice gave her a soul, in a sense. I didn’t give her a fake voice or anything, but I did talk to her when I was alone on my various travels. I poured so much reliance into her that maybe I did leave a residue. Personally, the only real damage to the car was the delayed (and unnecessary) release of the side airbags. It is a clearly repurposeful car with no other damage, other than cleaning the underside of some stuck-on debris. They’re absolutely going to try to resell her. I didn’t even get to have a proper goodbye with her, but everything was moving so fast and my mind and emotions just couldn’t keep up.
So Alice is gone now. But did my love and affection for her imbue in her something extra? We talk about buildings in this way… that they are haunted by the good and the bad. Have you ever bought a used car and couldn’t make heads or tails over why it just wasn’t “being” the car you wanted it to be? Maybe the vehicle had owner attachments.
I don’t know where Alice ended up. Honestly, I don’t even like thinking about where the car I took such good care of was dumped. When I saw her in the towing lot, she was just crammed in between other vehicles that were a million times worse than she was. I didn’t like seeing it then and I don’t want to think of it now.
Alice had her flaws as a car, but she took me on one of the most profound and pivotal journeys of my life. She helped me guide myself towards my true authentic-self and I thank the universe for bringing us together to navigate those straits safely. I wish I could have done more to honor her, like we honor those big beautiful historic or military ships that sit docked for decades – harboring their ghosts and memories until they are lost in the mists of time.
I love you, Alice. I hope my love haunts you as you continue your own journey in this topsy turvy universe. Godspeed my friend.
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