Bonding is really a question of giving time to someone or something and allowing their finer qualities to get to you.

Even a disagreeable person has someone who finds him/her agreeable after a while of spending time together.

Like we say back home: Monkey no fine, but him mama like am (no matter how ugly the monkey is, his mother is quite enthused with him).

In my case, the love and bonding is between my car and I.

It’s not that my SUV is ugly. No! Far from it. But as the name depicts, it is still a Sport Utility Van. Made to accommodate my brood and I, plus the excessive grocery bags.

In my head, I am a classy diva and when my husband wanted to get me a new car, I wanted a snazzy red corvette to paint the town in lovely colors. I could see myself cruising down Beltway 8 or i10 with my sun roof down and a scarf carelessly slung round my neck and my kinky hair (not flowing like the locks of a Caucasian damsel) bouncing, maybe just a little. I would wear an over-sized pair of dark sunglasses and a whole lot of attitude. I went to sleep for several nights with a happy smile on my face 🙂

I craftily dropped hints all over the place for my Corvette desire to dear husband of mine, but he looked at me with that expression of ” where did you fall and hit your head?” promptly explaining to me, that as a matronly mama, I should have an accommodating car, so that the children can have enough room and to leave the snazzy bits for retirement or when they have all gone off to College/University. Reluctantly throwing my sunroof cruising thoughts out of the window, I grudgingly acquiesced.

We went ahead and purchased my sedate looking (white for that matter) SUV, and our romance began. Every morning, I would start her (her name is Gloria) and she will respond with a perfect hum. Gloria, has been very faithful and loving these past months. No day did she nag or grumble. No day did she fail to work as expected. She was good in all weather, rain or shine. As I am about to trade Gloria in, I am jolted with the realization, that indeed, I have come to love my dependable SUV, white color and all and that I would miss her. I could not paint the town the colors that I wanted, but she did get me around as often as I needed.

Not that I have forgotten my snazzy Corvette, there’s still a whole lot of time for that 😉

© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha