A Car

My poor car seems to be on the way out and it's been taken somewhere to be fixed.
Where? I don't know!
Will the fixing work? Ditto!
The thing is, although it's a disgracefully scruffy mess, it has a fantastic engine that takes me to Newcastle on just over half a tank of petrol.
It has also moved the Offsprogs up and down the M1 to Leeds and up and down the M23 to Brighton with enormous carloads of sharp, heavy, bulky, sometimes smelly (art smells, not unclean smells) stuff: countless times.
It has transported half of the band the Irrepressibles to a gig miles away with an accordion, a keyboard, a cello and two guitars on a boiling hot day. It has taken me and my guitars to gigs all over the UK and it once took our whole family to Italy and back.
It took the vacuum cleaner to Edinburgh to deep clean McMum's flat.
It has carried bagfuls of stuff to the dump, on many an occasion. It has transported small trees and large people.
Bits of it have fallen off, and the upholstery looks like the plumage of an ancient bird: torn, grey, misshapen. The floor mats went ages ago when the inside of it was prone to flooding and the footwells filled up with water when it rained.
It smells of old dogs.
Nobody wants to steal it- it's far too ugly. It's worth nothing at all second hand and can't be traded in for anything at all.
But once you start up the engine and get into gear, it roars joyously and takes me where I want to go smoothly and silently as the most sophisticated of vehicles. It became part of my liberation and continues to service my independence. Can you be in love with a car?
I think you can.