American. . .

. . . dream. . .

"You're throwing away your money," she would sometimes say.  "Buy a house."  In her eyes, paying rent was throwing away money.  It was the prevailing logic of her generation, the children of immigrants who arrived in this country with very little, worked hard and carved out a well-deserved place in the American landscape.

I, unlike most of my, and successive generations, left my parents' home when I got married, and did live in a rented apartment at that time.  It was a wonderful place in a lush, wooded area within the city itself and within minutes downtown.

To my simple mind, it was the ideal living situation.  We put furniture in the place, hung pictures and lived.  If anything broke, leaked, stopped heating or cooling, made too much noise, cracked or otherwise caused a problem within our 'home', we called maintenance.  When we got home from work the next day, the problem was solved.  All we had to do was pay our rent, preferably on time.
And we did.

But oh how Mom thought that 'owning' a place was what young adults were supposed to do.  It meant staking out one's own turf.  It was putting money into something that was your own;  and investment in the future.  And of course she was correct.

Only now. . . there is no 'maintenance' to call.

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We've tried to tell him. . .

. . . that the car is worth preserving. . . at least FOR NOW!!

For some reason, Russ is not as keen on preserving the automobile which was bestowed upon him upon graduation and his subsequent relocation to Los Angeles. (City of Angels, as that cowboy fella says)

Sure, it's old. 'Bout twelve years now. Sure, it's got lots of miles on it. Around 150,000. But it's a Toyota. Those suckers have been known to last 200 or more thousand miles if maintained.

And we've been encouraging the maintenance. And he's done it. As far as we know. But whenever an oxygen sensor or an electric window goes up he gets discouraged.

Not that we don't understand. After all, he's trying to develop a career in the movie industry. Motion pictures. Film. You know. So work isn't always regular, steady, stabile, conventional, lucrative. . . you get the picture. (Pun intended)

But STILL. It's a car. That runs. That was FREE. Yeah you have to put money into it. But not to purchase it. It's paid off. It's YOURS baby!

Be clear. I am not belittling his point of view. We love the guy. It's just a little frustrating to hear that the next time something other than an oil change is required to keep the car on the road, he may just throw his hands up and say. . .
THAT'S IT. And we're not really sure that's in his best interest at this particular time. That's all.




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