I'm not into cars. So why did I travel 1600km to say goodbye to one?

The Age

14-07-2025

I'm not into cars. I'm appreciative when one transports me to work or play without incident and I like playing ' spotto ', but I have no care for brands, engine specs or the merits of electric v petrol.
So why did I recently travel all the way from my home near Byron Bay to Melbourne specifically to say goodbye to ROP, the nickname of the car I've owned for 23 years? It was because of love.
A big part of that love is for my daughter, who adopted our family car when she moved interstate for uni. I wanted to support her while she went to the wreckers to collect her personal belongings after the car accident that resulted in ROP being written off. But I also wanted – needed – to make this trip for myself.
I needed to say goodbye to the car that has been an integral part of my family's life, including bringing both our children home from hospital, the trip north for our interstate sea change, both kids learning to drive, and then accompanying my daughter back south for her move to university.
Back in 2002, when I needed a new second-hand car, my cousin advised me to wait until I found one I fell in love with. I laughed, yet fate stepped in. ROP (his name was simply the three letters of his original Victorian numberplate and transcended his later change to NSW plates) was listed in the wrong price section of the Trading Post (remember that pre-online source of all second-hand purchases?) and was located outside our planned car-shopping radius.
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By the time we arrived, I'd confessed to my husband that I'd tricked him into looking at an automatic car instead of the manual he wanted but, within five minutes of the test drive, we were both smitten with the cute yet practical red Toyota wagon.
Fast-forward from birth to death. A couple of months ago, ROP tragically met his end on a dark and wet night. My niece, who was driving, nearly managed to avoid the multi-car pile-up, but even hitting one corner was enough to have him declared a write-off.
Fortunately, no one was injured, but my daughter was devastated and I too shed more than a few tears. My hubby flew down to deal with the initial aftermath and, a few weeks later when it became clear my daughter only had a short window to collect personal belongings, I made a same-day decision to fly down to help, knowing that we both needed time to grieve and say goodbye.