The only thing not to like is that it's not paid off.

A couple months ago some nice people from Chrysler's web agency asked me if I'd like to drive a new Town & Country mini van for three months. They also asked if they could pretty please give me gas money and if I would pretty please take my family on a couple road trips.

I said yes and celebrated by ramming my van into the side of the garage.

When they first (as an aside Logan used to work for Chrysler's print agency) contacted me I said no because I knew I'd like it. I knew I'd love it. It's like asking me if I want to fly first class for half the trip and then head back to coach just before the meal is served. It's more painful to know what you're missing.

I drive an older model minivan we paid off last year. I don't really care about cars, which is against the law in Detroit, I also drive only about 20 miles a week generally within a five mile radius. In a circle really, maybe you've seen me.

When they added the free gas, I thought to myself, "Oh what the hell! Sure sign me up and then I'll ram my car into the garage and cost my family thousands of dollars in car repairs!"

Woooo! I wonder if the body shop will accept gas cards as payment.

When they dropped the car off in December I climbed in and felt a giant pit in my stomach. The pit said, "March is going to suck for you."

I proceeded to sit in the car saying as a mantra, "I love everything about this car, except it's not paid for."

Because that's pretty much the only thing there isn't to love about the car in contrast to the minivan sitting scraped up and bent in my garage. Well that and the fact that the Town and Country hasn't been rammed into the side of my garage.

Yet.

Just kidding Chrysler!

Things I specifically love about the car (which aren't exactly specific to this car):

The Remote Starter is probably my favorite invention ever and when they pry the van from my cold dead hands, I will go out and get one installed on my van (you know once I pay to have the thousands of dollars in damage repaired.) Since I drive for about two minutes, two or three times a day, the car never gets warm. Not seeing the sun for 5 months a year is enough suffering for me, I don't need to be freezing my ass off every time I leave the house.

The automatic rear hatch is incredibly convenient, though nothing new to the minivan crowd.

The Stow and Go thing (the rear seats fold into the floor of the van) is also so nice. I rarely use it since I'm not typically hauling large pieces of furniture around for my two minute drives, but if I wanted to I could and I wouldn't have to spend 20 minutes sweating, swearing and hauling the chairs out of my van to make similar space.

We've never had a sunroof in our cars, except the 1973 BMW 2002 we owned right before we got married. It was a super cute car, it made you happy to look at it. The sun roof was so large and the glass around the sides of the car stretched so far, it felt almost like a convertible. The cutest part about that car was how Logan brought it home and then mentioned the fact that it had no brakes. While I drove it down the street. SUPER CUTE! The sun roof is really nice to have, sometimes it feels almost like there's sun because there's so much more light in the car than we're used to.

Things which are nice about the new design:

I like boxier cars, see the 2002 and 1985 Jetta as examples of cars I have loved before. So the boxier shape of the new Caravan is pleasant to me.

The swiveling seats are a novelty for the kids. Driving home from school the carpool kids are filled with anticipation waiting to see which way the seats will be facing. You can tell we're in Detroit because one of the little girls said when we first got the van, "I hope Santa Claus brings my family this van!" One of these days I'll put the table in place and really blow their little minds.

The table is an interesting feature, the kids liked it well enough on our trip to Chicago but for our general travel, it's more trouble than it's worth. I know a lot of families who are super busy with kid's activities so their kids eat in the car and do homework there as well. The table would be really convenient for that. In my family we are not that busy, which means my kids will never get into a good school and will be homeless because they aren't in five extra curricular activities in elementary school.

I'm okay with that as long as it means we don't have to eat dinner in our car 2-4 times a week.

My kids love the television in the car, but we only use it on trips which are longer than 45 minutes. I love television for kids and its incredible brain sucking power. But we get enough of that at home, we don't need it in the car for our quick circle trips around town. If we drove further or had kids in a bunch of different activities after school we'd probably use the televisions more.

This model comes with Sirius satellite radio, I'm not much of a fan of radio in the car, I mostly just try not to fall asleep when I drive. (Just Kidding Chrysler!) But through Sirius we've been introduced to Radio Disney and Madison has developed a deep and binding love of Hannah Montana. I blame her peers and her preadolescent need to fit in. This is the same reason I listen to Radiohead, truth be told, so I can't blame her. At least until the 60th time I've heard that one song while driving 1.4 miles and then I have it stuck in my head. Kids like repetition, I learned that from the Teletubbies years ago but this is a new level of hell.

My few complaints:

The navigation system makes me feel like my mother trying to maneuver Call Waiting. Why can't it be a little more like Google maps? I'm reasonably intuitive about these types of things but this system has left me screaming more than once and made me late for an appointment when it refused to find the address I needed. It turned out my destination was in a different neighboring city than the one I specified. It might have been nice if Marge, our navigator, had just said "I can't find that address in this city. Did you mean [neighboring city]....?"  Instead she tried to fake it endlessly looking for the address while I called Logan and had him look up the address for me. Frustrating, but probably not specific to the van.

I do like to make it tell me how to get home. Especially when I'm just three blocks away picking the kids up from school. It kind of feels like the car is celebrating where we live with us. Like, "Wooo! I'll guide you home! And it won't be to that hell hole you used to live in. Look at where you live! Awesome! Put me in the garage and YOU ARE HOME!"

The part of the rear consoles which holds the televisions and the heat controls rattles and it makes me crawl out of my skin. For $45,000 a car shouldn't rattle. Logan assures me this is probably a car-specific issue which could easily be fixed but I don't want to give up the van long enough to do that since I only have three months with it.

It's a really nice car, but it's still a minivan. Once you're driving a minivan a little part of you has to die with it. For the first few days I had this van I drove around with that excited new car feeling, maybe even feeling a little sexy in this expensive car. And then I realized, "Wait, I'm still driving around in a minivan."

I'm still not cool, I'm a mom, in a minivan, in suburban Michigan.

But now I'm a mom, in a minivan, in the suburbs with a warm butt (four heated seats) and a really nice car. Maybe that's as good as it gets.

Comments

[Peeved Michelle]

I am about to sell myself out for a minivan. It is even worse than it sounds. I am trading in my 2006 Volvo XC90 (the SUV one) for a used Kia Sedona minivan.

[Geeky Mom]

I know what you mean about driving a minivan.. I felt like I had aged 10 years. I was 24, driving a minivan, baby in the back and baby on the way.
Now that the kids are older, I drive a Mini convertible. Heaven!

[Melissa Summers]

I felt the same way when we got rid of our SUV for the van but in the end it was a wise choice. You just have to be a little numb inside.

[sneakyg]

If you buy the van, the kids can live in it when their lack of soccer and clarinet lessons leads to homelessness. I mean, with TV, heat, swiveling chairs and a table, who needs a house? :)

[Bonzai]

I feel your pain. I gave up my zippy-fast red Acura Integra for my last American-made-car-I-swear boring black Buick Rendezvous. And sadly, I get kind of excited about the idea of a shiny new Toyota minivan with all the configurable seating.

But I have you beat - I didn't hit the garage (though I've hit our house-twice) - I backed out of my driveway and straight into my neighbor's first brand new minivan in 10 years that they had all of 5 days. That was over 2 years ago, and I still cringe every time I see her.

[bigpikchur.blogspot.com]

Dude, you're driving around a van with an endless supply of free gas!!!! That right there hopefully cancels out any uncool feelings about the whole "mini-van" thing. Basically, Chrysler is your sugar daddy until March. Keep enjoying it!
Jules
House of Jules

[Becky]

TV or DVD player?

I'm just curious. We've got a DVD player in my SUV (totally against my wishes, I still don't know how that happened) and we have the same rule about only using it on longer trips. I don't want to spend half my life setting up a DVD for the kids to watch on the ten minute drive to school, so I'd probably be more lenient if it was a TV. But I doubt it.

[Dawn]

The remote starter is a gift straight from the baby Jesus. (Well, mine actually was since it was a Christmas present) No more scraping ice! No more scorching hot steering wheel in the summer! What a wonderful world.

Enjoy that Town and County, Melissa, after all you went through with selling the house, you deserve all the good things that are coming your way.

[clinkter]

I live in a city not far from you and I am so terrified that I live in your old neighborhood! I cringe every time you mention it.

Anyway, enjoy the van!

[Melissa Summers]

I was still in Royal Oak before so don't worry.

Dawn: It's a dvd and you can hook up a video game system to it, but the Wii would be difficult.

It also comes with a Satellite TV thing with Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network and Disney Channel.

For us the rule is still 45 minute drive, just because they don't need TV to be in the car for maximum 10 minutes while we drive to Target.

[Strizz]

I stopped reading after paragraph one. Why you ask? Because my mind just kept repeating HOW COME NO ONE ASKS MEEEEE TO DRIVE A VAN FOR FREEEE!!!!!! I find it hard to concentrate when it does that.

http://sanctitysabbatical.blogspot.com/

[m.]

"In my family we are not that busy, which means my kids will never get into a good school and will be homeless because they aren't in five extra curricular activities in elementary school.

I'm okay with that as long as it means we don't have to eat dinner in our car 2-4 times a week."

THANK YOU for writing this, Melissa! A return to sanity! Can you please go on Oprah and convince the insane hockey parents sleeping in their cars at 5:30am at the end of my street to get a life? They need to watch that scene from 'The Breakfast Club' on their minivan TV's, where Emilio Estevez freaks out about his dad, "Win! Win! Win!" :P

Enjoy the Winter of the Van...

[Suebob Davis]

Yeah, but you're one of the coolest people in the world - in a minivan.

[Erika]

I've been eyeing the Town & Country, but like you said, it is still a mini-van. I opted instead for the Ford Freestyle, considered a crossover, but inside, it looks just like a mini-van. Actually for as small as it looks on the outside, it surprisingly roomy in the interior. Nothing like my Expedition though, man, I loved that truck.

[Mel]

Minivans age you, Lol...Exactly why this Michigan (Kalamazoo) women will NOT be having more than 1 child, because I can not drive one. Can not. Will not. My future husband says "Oh, they're not so bad."

I'm going to be one of those soccer mom's with the cool SUV's. Yeah, that'll be me. Lol...

[Melissa Summers]

Gas mileage and the difference in price pushed us to the van.

[Jessica]

I can relate. 2 years ago, I was swinging single with a way cool Honda Pilot. Fast forward - I now have an infant, 2 stepkids, a husband and a not so cool Honday Odyssey. I keep chanting my mantra (what I drive doesn't define me) and hoping for a windfall so I can buy the Suburban of my dreams. How scary is that?

[BOSSY]

Bossy hates it when the garage runs into the car.

[Steve J]

The car does make you cool - in the parent crowd. There is really no point in being cool in any other crowd - trying to be cool with the young, hip, crowd that you used to run with would just be kind of sad now.

[Cherie]

We paid off our minivan this fall. It's somewhat sad because it was my first new car ever. Then again, I don't care too much about what I drive. It fits my three kids and our dog. Even with fewer kids, as they get older, there is more car pooling going on.

I will definitely upgrade the minivan with something like what you're driving when it's time to replace it. My family is 8 hours away, so the table and swiveling seats would come in handy on those long trips. We opted not to get a DVD player in our car when we bought it and I don't regret that. We have a portable DVD player we use sometimes and we also listen to books on CD.