I Know I'm Paranoid About My Car ... But With Good Reason

I have resorted to starting my car at the beginning of my day with the front door open.  I do that because the car now has some trouble starting in the morning.  Not usually in the afternoon, although it sounded like it had a problem one afternoon and that freaked me out, but it's gotten to be a common occurrence: I crank the engine, it takes longer than it's supposed to, it sounds like it's finally about to start but there's a half-second where the engine goes completely silent before you hear the "whoosh" of the engine finally turning on.  It now happens virtually every morning.

It's starts fine through the day, but I'm scared that this fucking car will just break down, again.  And what happens if it breaks down in a spot where my parents didn't think I'd be, like the community center?  For example, I'm writing this at the library across the parking lot from the gym because I'm going to exercise after this.  If the car doesn't start, I'm stuck at the library.  My folks think I'm working.  How the fuck am I going to explain that?

It's a constant worry, my car.  I really shouldn't have to live like this.  But I've tolerated for about a year, ever since I got really concerned about the huge spills appearing underneath the car.  And you know what?  I tolerate them.  Why?  Maybe because I'm being too paranoid.  Maybe there is nothing wrong, or at least too wrong, for me to worry about, at least for the time being.

But I've got to tell you that I have earned my paranoia.  I've been with this car for 20 years, so I think I knew my car when it was young, and while driving it around, it sure as hell does not sound young.  I heard small cues, noises and pings that start up, then never go away.  And although the car seems to run fine, one day it doesn't.  I was indoctrinated into this panicky way of thinking when I heard the constant whistling and grinding underneath my car.  I drove it, but I was searching through books at Barnes & Noble to try and diagnose it myself.  Then one day driving home from working the night shift the car just cut out.  That noise was the timing belt on its last threads.

I've been paranoid ever since.  Now it's comprehensive and vague -- I just worry about something, anything happening to my car.  And that hood that popped up out of the blue, even though I new goddamn well that I closed that fucking hood, I knew it would happen because ... well, I expect the worst from this car.  I have been under a permanent dread, the feeling that in a moment, something bad or even weird would happen.  While dealing with a flung-open hood -- and I swear, nothing like that has ever happened to anyone, ever -- I did not realize till now that my fears, unfounded and irrational to some, were realized.

One other thing I need to remember in my back pocket: During our usually tense one-on-one dinners a couple weeks back, when my car's hood was still getting fixed, Father said that the spare car, my sister's car, is available.  I think this is the first time he's ever said it, and it's the first time I have not dismissed it out of hand.  Shit, there will come a time where I will find a reliable job and I will have to ditch this car because I need peace of mind.  I still love this car, I really do, but I forgot how even getting into a car and turning it on and backing down a driveway without giving a second thought to, "Will this car die and fuck me over today?" feels like.  In the meantime, I just have to cross my fingers that my baby won't get sick before I bring it in for its oil and transmission fluid change.

Oh, by the way, Shirley Manson (whom I'm facebook friends with): I know I'm paranoid: