If This Vans a Rockin'....

Our history with cars is not the greatest. We bought a powder blue 1992 Lincoln Town Car the day after the September 11th 2001 attacks in New York. (The event with the twin towers had nothing to do with buying a new car other than the fact that our only other car died as I was making my way home that day.)

We have driven that car virtually into the pavement over the past seven some-odd years. Lately, it has shown signs that it was ready, like an aging Stallion, to be led into a field and put out of its misery and perhaps ground into a food source for other farm animals.

I have not gone to a car dealership and tried to secure financing for a new minivan (which is what we need to transport our expanded family) for several reasons:

1. I knew that minivans were much more expensive than we could afford.
2. I felt that with a the flagging economy, financing would be harder to secure.
3. I had a sneaking suspicion that when I told the car sales guy that I had no down payment and could only afford a certain low amount per month, he or she would laugh so hard, they might hurt themselves and I could did not want a busted gut injury on my conscience.

Monday, as I attempted to drive to the train station, I noticed that the Town Car was riding a little low. A light came on the dashboard that read Air Susp. I think that every warning light that could go on in that car has gone off at least once in front of my nervous eyes, but this one was new. Before I knew what was happening, I hit a small bump in the road and it felt like the back end of the car was going to bounce off of the road. At the same moment, the trunk locking mechanism broke off and the trunk lid slammed into the back windshield. (This was not entirely shocking as I had the trunk lock broken over a year ago and had it reattached with string and duct tape. This kind of ingenuity has been a part of my family for years. I still hear stories of my forefathers who came west in wagons held together largely with butcher's twine, electrician's tape and dreams.)

I decided on Monday that it was time to seek out options. I had heard of leasing before and according to the radio spots, it could cost half the monthly payments of buying. So, I popped over the website for D&M Auto Leasing and got hooked up with a man named Jay. I emailed a list of my laughably unrealistic requirements and my even more laughable trade-in. After a couple of emails and a couple of phone conversations, Jay found me a minivan to purchase. Even more incredible, he found me financing to fit my needs. Today, he drove over our new van right to our door, we signed all of the paperwork he needed and he drove off in the Town Car, presumable to find a big enough gun to shoot it with.

Here it is, the new van:

It is a 2008 Chevrolet Uplander. It can seat 7. It has a built in DVD player that the kids can watch from the back seat. It even has these nifty wireless headphones that they use to hear the sound without it bothering us in the front seats. Here are the kids doing just that:

I was even able to coax Marcy out into camera range to try it on for size:

Even the cat wants to go for a ride:

Okay, maybe not.

Praise the Lord for helping us find a vehicle that fit our needs. As always, He has provided just as we needed it.

It was the easiest car buying experience of my life.