Spring has arrived, and I realized that I’ve been a car owner for a year already as I bought my first car late March last year. The car is still the largest single purchase that I have made in my life up to this point. Insurance is not cheap given I’m in the “high-risk young male driver” category, and the car isn’t exactly good on gas, but I didn’t need to spend too much money on it because I don’t drive it very much. In the last twelve months, I’ve put 3000-3500 miles on the car, and I’m sure a good chunk of that was from the time my parents and I drove down to Washington D. C.. The trip to D. C. is the longest trip I’ve taken this car on. For myself, I only drive the car on weekends to buy groceries and perhaps go to the odd social gathering. Having a car is of course very nice, as the car is big and comfy and has pretty much all of the amenities I need. Having a car is also almost a necessity given the limited public transportation available in the area. It’s so much more convenient to be able to go where I want instead of see if others can give me a ride or waiting for the bus (in the cold hard winter). Speaking of winter, one thing I was concerned about was having to dig my car out from a lot of snow since I don’t have covered parking, but luckily the winters has been pretty mild this year, and so I didn’t really experience the treacherous winter driving conditions and having to excavate my car from two feet of snow.
Over the last year, the car has been pretty good as it didn’t develop any problems on its own. I did spend some money to repair the car when a rodent got into the hood and chewed up some plastic and wires, but otherwise the car has behaved nicely in its first year under my ownership. I’m not a car maintenance expert, but I’ll be sure to get all the necessary maintenance done so the car will continue to operate without issues. Hopefully the car will be alright as long as I own it, and I’ll likely keep this car until I get my doctoral degree and maybe even beyond that.