The Perils of Going Green

In the past couple of weeks we've taken two trips up to Seattle Washington to visit Mark's sister Kathy and her family. While our two visits were heart warming, in stark contrast, the driving up there part was more of an eye opening experience.

The 1st  trip was taken using our family's favorite vehicle, our Ford Excursion that we refer to as "The Beast".

The Beast has taken us all over the place.  It's comforted us with its spaciousness, warmed us with its seat heaters, and pulled us through coastal sand, deep mountain snow, and the notoriously rain soaked Pacific Northwest roads.  It holds eight passengers in blissful comfort.  And, despite its loud diesel engine that provokes scoffs and scorns from the particular breed of  ultra environmentally conscious folks our town is so famous for, we can't resist our love affair with the darn thing.

Notwithstanding its thundering noise, The Beast is also notorious for it's size.  A year ago, before taking a long trip across the western states, I ordered an exterior luggage carrier that fits on the back.  I was getting ready to haul 7 teenagers with all their camping gear and I knew I'd need MORE SPACE than the Excursion already so generously offered.  While placing the order for the luggage carrier, the guy on the other end of the phone horrified me by asking for the make and model of my car.

"Its a Ford...uhhh...Excursion," I answered sheepishly.


There was a really long pause.  When he finally came to from his silent stupor he said, "Ma'am, are you aware you are driving the biggest SUV on the road?  

"Yes." I answer weakly.

"And you're saying you need more storage space?"  Apparently, he'd never seen our family go on a road trip.

So when we headed up to Seattle a few weeks ago to visit family, we, of course, took The Beast.  The kids had ample leg room, multiple power outlets for their movies and games, their own arm rests, and 2-3 cup holders each.  One kid even had a whole row to himself!  Little did we know how blissful this drive was.  Had we known, we'd of slowed down to the speed limit and enjoyed the journey a lot more.

On the 2nd trip up to Seattle, we took a decidedly different approach.  A greener more economical approach.  We decided that it was silly to drive such a huge SUV all the way up there when our family could easily fit into the Camry I drive when I'm running errands in town.  So we packed up the car thinking it would be nice to simplify things by zipping up north in something a little smaller.  After all, it's a mid-size car and we're a mid-size family right??

WRONG.

These three children were NOT happy with our new plan.  They actually had to sit next to each other!  All these years I mistakenly THOUGHT my kids were great car travelers.  Oh, I was woefully wrong!  Apparently children are only good travelers when you provide them with a 5ft. parameter within the vehicle so that they can stake claim to their own territory.  Among the complaints logged during this trip, we heard them belch out the following tortured grudges toward their siblings:

• Stop touching me!
• Do you have to read with your elbows out?
• Your stuff keeps taking up all my leg room!
• I don't have a door to sleep against!
• I can hear the music in your headphones!
• I can hear him breathing!
  
• How come I always have to sit in the middle?
• Somebody smells and it isn't me!
  

Worse yet, even Mark and I began to feel the pangs of  regret at our own misguided plan!  As we all too soon discovered, to our extreme discontent, that when driving a Camry:

• You can't use your size to intimidate other drivers.
• You can't use your loud diesel engine to intimidate other drivers.
  
• A blinker means nothing coming from a mid-size car. (When you're in a giant black SUV, just one click of your blinker and you become like Moses parting the Red Sea.  Miracles happen. Everybody moves.)
  
• There are no duel controls for heat and cool (this can be a marriage breaker.)
• You're close enough to your kids that you can hear them complain.
• Don't even try leaning your seat back unless you like knees forced into your back.
  
• There aren't enough cup holders to hold the amount of liquid required for taking all the doses of aspirin you're gonna need if you've decided to drive a small car on a road trip with three children.

Oh boy have we learned a valuable lesson.  That is, when trying to save the environment, think of your own personal environment first.  Namely the environment inside the small car you'll be riding in and the emotional state of its passengers who, if unhappy, will bother you for eight or more hours.  Save that environment first by driving an Excursion on all family outings.  I think that's why they call the mid-size a town car.  It's definitely not a road trip car!!

We decided that SUV stands for:  Saving   oUr   enViroment!  We'll save yours later.

I'm getting a bumper sticker for my Excursion so it will explain why we're driving it so much again.   

"Think Globally. Act Locally."