February 01, 2008

Greenishness

We're tossing around this revolutionary idea - can we be a one-car family? We had three cars for an embarrassingly long time, because we were too lame to get rid of one. Now we have the Subaru, and my ancient Tercel (1993!). It's a good little car, but is starting to have some things wrong with it, plus of course to Jeff it's miniscule and horribly uncomfortable - why he chose to drive it to Seattle I don't quite know.

So we were talking about getting a new car or a new used car, but I balked and resisted. I wanted a small car, a hybrid car, and now, finally, no second car at all. Given our lifestyle, do we really NEED two cars? We both work at home, after all. True, when we need another, it's awfully nice to have - if we happen to be going different places one night, or if Jeff has to drive to Seattle. But most days the only driving that HAS to happen is taking Ethan to school. We even carpool on pickups. And if you consider what it costs to maintain and insure a car, much less to buy a new one, one begins to wonder. Or at least I do.

My radical proposal is that we at least try being a one-car family and give it a fair chance. It would mean Jeff likely renting a car when he has to go the office (in Seattle), since flying is even more inconvenient. And environmentally unsound. It may mean that if we're going in different directions, one of us has to - gasp! - take the bus. It's lowering to admit, but I only recently rode the bus in Portland for the first time. I mean, Portland has a great public transportation system. If we had to, we could take the bus all the way to Ethan's school - of course, then I'd be spending two hours getting him there and then getting home again. But I COULD.

I'll let you know how it goes.

Posted by ktingey at 11:54 PM | Comments (8)