Ode to the Road

Recently I've been thinking about my aging car. It's a 1999 Honda Civic, and while still highly serviceable, has also seen better days in its 11 years on the road.

I bought the car used exactly 7 years ago yesterday. This was a major milestone. I've been driving for about 14 years (I didn't get my license at exactly sixteen), so I've owned this one car for half the years I've been driving - it's lasted me as long as my first three vehicles put together.

When I bought it, it had just a bit under 49,000 miles on the odometer. It very recently cracked 161,000 miles. That equates to just over 112,000 miles since I've owned the car, or about 16,000 miles per year. That's a fair amount of driving, and I must say the Civic has been a pretty nice car for me during that time.

I remember posting previously that I put about 45,000 miles on the car in my first two years of ownership, as this included driving to Utah and back (from PA) and at least one trip to Cape Cod. It's almost hard to think that one day, probably next year or the one thereafter, I'll likely be shopping for my next car. I hope that these last months or years are as enjoyable as many of the long drives I've taken in the car in the seven years that I've had it.