7/8/05; by Ruth Zaslow

Note: work information below refers to her Phila.-based university job

Until about a month ago, we owned two cars. An Audi sedan, which I drove for work for three years, and a pick up. My husband drives that. We moved last week back to Los Angeles, and we bought a new Audi convertible about a month before the move. The weather's so sunny here, we wanted to take advantage of it.

The previous Audi was my husband's when I met him. We're Audi lovers. They're reliable--the one we just sold still had its original clutch after more than 230,000 miles. Sure, repairs are spendy, but we have always been able to find local people to fix them, so we don't have to take the car to the dealer.

The main kind was for my job--I was living in my car sometimes. I visited community colleges all over the state. I made sure that I get to each one once a year. And the ones that have dual admissions policy with the university--those I get to at least once a term. So I'm on the road a lot. The last two month reimbursement period, for example, I was reimbursed $1500-and nearly all of that was for mileage.

Yes-well, until the last couple of months when I was having trouble with the old Audi. It was getting kind of unreliable. So, I started renting cars. It can be nice-like getting a brand new car.

It was for the state, so usually, just a compact--the cheap ones. You know some of those cars-they were new-but they had tape decks in them? I can't understand why, in this day-and-age, they didn't at least have a CD player.

Once I showed up and they only had a Cadillac left. That was fun. Nice and big. But I still like my car better. Most of the cheapies didn't even have things like electric windows and keychain door locks.

I usually leave in the morning, and put on the radio. I'll listen to one round of the NPR morning news. But as soon as they start to repeat, I'll put on some music, like jazz. If I can find it on the radio, I'll do that. Otherwise, I'll play my CD's.

Pretty soon I'll get bored with the music, and then I'll put in my books on tape. That's usually what I do the entire trip.

I usually get them from the local library. Occasionally I buy them, but they're $40 each, and that seems like a lot for something I'm only going to listen to once. A couple of other people in my office do a thing where they rent books on tape-they even share them-but I haven't gotten around to doing that. The library is so convenient.

Best of all? I like historical non-fiction. Not too long ago, I read something called Shifting Sands. That's a good example. A woman traveled through Egypt. It had story, romance, character development. And it was based on historical facts.

For some reason, male voices annoy me a lot of the time. I do like it when the reader uses voice expressively. There's even one woman who takes on different voices for different characters-different accents even. If I'm really enjoying a story, I might even sit in my car and listen for up to half an hour after I've arrived. I get that absorbed. It's like the car is my living room.

Only in the sense that I spend so much time there. Not in the sense of any other activities.

Yes. I don't do it all the time--like if I'm in heavy traffic, or on a tricky route where I need to pay attention. But if I'm on a straight, not busy stretch of road, sure. It's a nice, uninterrupted time to be on touch with someone.

I don't make work phone calls. I don't have any file access. No internet. I save those calls for when I'm on the computer. Then I have everything I might need.

Social calls. I almost always call my mom when I'm on the road. I usually call at least one of my sisters and sometimes my brother. We're spread out over a couple of states. I might call my husband, but we don't talk much on the phone. It might just be to give him some instructions or something.

Of course. But I don't use it in the car. Much too distracting. Accessing the screen seems dangerous. A friend of mine was just telling me that he had one of those video screens in the car.

I got the impression for the front seat passenger. When he was demonstrating looking at it, he craned his whole right side over. That's just going too far, though. Too dangerous.

That could help me a lot. I could do background work on the community in the car.

When I'm going on a trip, I have to research the community where the community college resides. I work in recruiting and marketing, so I have to research an area: what are the employment and education patterns currently, where are they trending, what degrees are needed, what will be needed. That kind of thing.

I explore it all when I'm in the community. I'll spend time on my laptop with an internet connection and get basic information. I'll meet with people, interview them, talk to them around town.

I think I'd go in more prepared. That could only be a good thing. I'd have a faster understanding of what they needed and valued; I'd be more attuned to the issues, wants and needs there. Also the trip might end up being shorter.

I use my laptop in meetings to show our website, to take advisors on virtual tours that they can give their students. If there's no live internet connection, I show a Powerpoint presentation instead. And for backup, I have transparencies. I call in to the office, of couse, And if there's that live connection, I'm checking my email.

I like to have a nice dinner and check out the community, where the locals hang out. I explore the community. I try to plan it so my trips are a little like a vacation. Let's say I visit Strasburg; I might stay in the Lancaster area, because it's nicer. I might shop, stay at a B&B. When I go out to dinner, it's likely that I'll meet people at talk to them. Same at breakfast the next morning. So, I might be doing work in the sense of meeting people, but it's very informal, mostly just me relaxing.

It was a Dodge Dart. I was 16 and my dad gave it to me. He had an eye for junkers and liked to fix them up-up to a point. That Dart, I drove it with a broken windshield for almost a year. There were dents in the fenders, and you know how my dad got them out? He chained the thing to a lightpost and pulled! I still remember that car. It was cute. White leather seats.

Maybe. I had an Imapala in the early 80's, then a Comet, a Corolla, then another Corolla, then a truck.

I guess one thing that hasn't changed: the convertible. Of course, I had no choice with my first car. The Dart just happened to be a convertible. And now, this newest car is a convertible too. But in between, I wasn't interested in owning one. It just wasn't practical for the location. Now that we're moving back to a sunny climate, this new car is a dream for both of us. It's really cherried out.

I really like music. A tape player, CD, radio. Color has never mattered. I've always bought used. I've been a big fan of Audi's and Toyotas.

It's a '96 and it looks brand new. It's always been garaged. It has a white leather interior. And it's spotless, spotless inside and out. It drives great and handles great. I love to drive it! It's like: is there anywhere I can go today in the car-please?”

My dad was always very into American cars. We had Chevy's, Fords. We also always had something to pull a trailer. I remember at one point, my dad inherited an old '54 Chevy pick-up from his father. He was so proud of that pick-up! It meant so much to him. But he didn't drive it much.

That would have to be the old Audi. That's the car John had when he and I got together. We spent a lot of our early time together hanging out, going on drives, around that car.

Ugh, an accident I had in the Comet. It was snowing hard, hard, and there was no one else on the road except a huge truck. He tried to pass me and managed to hit me from the rear and then somehow from the front. It was awful.

It's changed in the last three years. I love cars for the freedom, the go-wherever-you-want-whenever-you-want aspect. But in the last three years, we've been living in downtown Philadelphia, and there is great public transportation where we were living. So I realized it is another kind of freedom not to have to get in the car. You can just leave the car parked and take a bus, a train, a taxi. It's easy, it's there, you can go out and party if you want and not worry about driving home. Of course, now that we've moved to LA, we're back to cars all the time.

Another thing: we always name our cars. This new one is named Marina. She's blue and we're living not far from a marina. The last car was called Otto-because it was German and also because it's a play on words “Otto” “auto.” Funny, Marina is the first female name we've given a car. But this car is definitely female.

She's so pretty.

Babe. We got the truck just after we saw that movie.

One change I've noticed is that as I'm getting older, I'm less comfortable driving at night. For work, I try never to drive at night. And if I'm on the highway and the conditions are rainy or snowy, I'm white knuckled. I feel more nervous these days. The older I get, the more I realize anything could happen.

Here's something you should know: I had a chance not too long ago to ride in a friend's new Beemer. Wow! It was like being in a human being!

It's like the car was alive. It took complete care of us. There were so many gizmos! She got a call from her boyfriend, and she didn't have to do anything but talk. No picking up the phone, nothing. And the sound quality. It was like he was right there in the car with us.

The stereo system was just like the phone. Hands off and no work at all. It practically knew what she wanted before she did. And there was a GPS, so there was no way to get lost. It was a weird feeling, in fact.

It was good, exciting, that it could do so much. It was like were in our living room, just enjoying each other. But it also made the ride an experience. Everything was so easy. But I guess for $80,000 or whatever, that' s what you get. I can't see paying that for a car. But I did like that stuff.

I told my husband about the GPS. Now we're thinking of getting one, being new to LA and all. We won't have to waste hours on the streets trying to figure out where we are and how to get where we want to go.

Posted at Jul 10/2005 02:41PM:
David Platt: Linked to Field Interviews