Wednesday, May 2, 2007

The Car That Haunts My Dreams

My first car was a 1980 Chevrolet Chevette. It had been one of the family cars for as long as I could remember and when I started to drive it was handed down to me. It was a horribly made car that was on its last legs, if you accelerated to fast it would backfire and shoot flames out the tailpipe, it other defects to numerous to mention, and I only drove it for a year. Despite all of this, it is car that I have a reoccurring dream about.

In this dream I discover that I did not actually get rid of the Chevette, but instead have been keeping it in storage. When I discover that I still have it a sense of relief and happiness washes over me. I hop into the Chevette and drive happily off into the sunset.

It does not take a degree in psychology to interpret what this dream means, doubtlessly it has to do with the events going on in my life around the time that I disposed of the car. A few weeks before getting rid of the car my younger my brother committed suicide.

His lifespan convinced almost exactly with the period of time that m family owned that car, so it pretty obvious as to what the car represents in my dream, my brother and the life I had before his death. God, how I wish that like in my dream that it was not actually gone, but rather stashed away somewhere waiting to be found. I wake up from this dream feeling wistfully sad.

It is dream that I have with increased frequency around certain anniversaries. Which mean that I will be having this dream much more often in the next few months. About a week from now will be what would have been his 26th birthday, and then in July the 1oth anniversary of his suicide, an event I look forward to with great trepidation, will occur.

Looks like I will behind the wheel of 1980 Chevette a lot more in the near future, sadly it will be only in my dreams.

3 comments:

Whitney said...

Not to belittle the situation but I too had a 1980 Chevrolet Chevette as my first car. It too was a family car that was handed down to me. Mine was dark blue. I loved the car because it meant freedom to me but it also had it's share of quirks. The radio didn't work so I had to use a "boombox" as my radio. the passenger was in charge of holding the radio and making sure the antenna was aimed right. It was a stick shift car and eventually the alternator went bad so I had to park on a hill everywhere I went so I could start it by popping the clutch. In the winter I would drive around with 10lbs of firewood or buckets of sand or something on the rear axle so I could get some sort of traction on slippery or snowy streets.

Your dreams could be your brother's way of letting you know he is still there in your life. I wouldn't look at it as a sad thing but more of a happy thing. That car was your first and you loved it with all it's quirks. You still love your brother with all his "quirks" too. Take care,
A fellow Chevette driver!!

Anonymous said...

I'm torn between expressing sympathy for the loss of your brother and saying how cool that flames would shoot out of the tailpipe!

The Agent of Entropy said...

Yeah it crappy quirks did make it kind of cool. I did enjot the flame shooting bit. Every morning on my way to school I would go by my brother and his friends wating for the school bust. I figured exactly when to stomp the accelerate to make backfire and shoot flames just as I went by them. Watching them jump was hialrious. On the other hand the morning that I was driving him to school and the breaks failed was simply terrifying