So, this evening, the Fridge went to a new home. It's been known to the family since it was new in 1989 and for the past nine years has been owned by first me (1995-1999) and then Mum (1999-2004). When I first owned it I was in my year at Lancaster University. I was barely out of my teens and it replaced the Van. I remember loving how smooth it was, how refined, how nicely it drived. It was a modern car and despite it being a white Toyota Corolla estate and it having done 120,000 miles I loved it. Mark, Donegan & I did the Three Peaks in it. I drove endless loaded-down jaunts up and down the M6 in it, first from Lancaster, then from Ambleside and of course Blackpool. I travelled the length and breadth of Britain in it, and as it never failed to work perfectly, and it was practical, and it was big and white, it was named the Fridge - a wonderfully useful big, white appliance. And yet like a Fridge it left you cold - even the silly stickers I put on it didn't help that much. I'm going to miss it now it's gone - it feels like a part of me has gone too - but at the time after 4 years and 75,000 miles I decided that I wanted something a little less clinical and sold it to Mum so I could buy a convertible. Five years on and Mum has sold it on too and, tired of it's remorseless efficiency, bought a coupe. When it drove off into the darkness tonight, sold on eBay for £102, a sizeable part of my past went with it.
Nine years, virtually all of my twenties. One (the only!) lengthy relationship. Three years at University. Two driving holidays. Three years in Blackpool. Three years in Seychelles. Two months of bumming around waiting for work. It's always been there. Except now it isn't. The new owner seems happy enough (although the stickers are going apparently...), but will he ever feel the same way about it that I do? Probably not...
Goodbye Fridge, and thank you for...nothing particularly special, but everything very well indeed.