It's funny. It looks ok, doesn't it? But it's dead and it's home while I find an undertaker willing to take it.
The kids' reactions have been varied though.
Marcel has many fond memories of me driving him and a combination of any five of Matt, Duckett, Andy, Scott, Ewan, Deeno, & Truesy places all their youth. He can't believe the beer bus has died for good and had admitted all his mates' great love of me and my car (the only seven seater amongst all the parents.) They had even been hoping to insure themselves for it and take it on trips now they are all starting to turn 17 and getting driving licenses. Sadly, that is not to be.
Charlotte is a real family girl so is probably most affected, on paper. Marcel works so rarely comes on outings to town, the beach or relatives' houses, so he will see little change. Charlotte and one of Thomas or I are the only ones other than Marcel who can legally be left behind. So, for example, this Sunday, given Marcel is working in the shop, one of Charlotte, Thomas or I is going to have to stay home and miss an invite for my nephew's birthday.
Léon has taken a while to catch up. Despite us talking about nothing else all week, other than the shock of the car being irreparable, he asked just last night when it was coming back! Pay attention, Léon!
Anna's reaction has been the strangest. She is very tearful about the whole thing, as if a pet has died, rather than a car. It took Thomas to point out to me that this has been Anna's car all her life, so she isn't really aware, like the others, that cars come and go. She thinks of it more like a family member so keeps bursting into tears and now it has been returned to us, she wants to go out and look at it, with big sad eyes. To cheer her up I have had to promise to start saving up for a Fiat 500 (I just omitted to point out that it may be five years before we reach the target figure!) Mind you, she has expressed a desire for it to be 'Buchanan tartan' in colour, so I can just stall her by saying I have not managed to source that model yet!
Amaia seems neither up nor down, but it'll hit her the first time she wants us all to go to the park or the windmills as a family, I guess. She won't want to go anywhere if Charlotte can't come.
As for me... It feels strange not to own a car for the first time since I was 22, or it will next week when they take it away, making me officially carless. It's altogether a bit too stressful trying to work out the logistics of moving us all about and sad to give up on the little social life we had. I suppose there'll be no more summer trips to Stirling or Culzean castle etc. But a new car is out of the question and public transport too expensive. We can't pick up visiting relatives at airports any more, nor can we get ourselves to the airport to visit them. But so far the most stressful thing is that turn of the key in the other car every morning as I know it won't always start, it is seven years old already, so wondering how I'm going get everywhere on time, the morning it lets me down is keeping me awake at night. Sigh.
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