Long ago in August 2003, my wife and I got married in Mount Airy, North Carolina. Mount Airy has not changed a lot since then.
We were "fortunate" to use my mother's almost new Mercedes 450SE. I say "fortunate" because the day was very hot, and the air conditioning unit blew a fuse in the car on the way to the reception.
Not only would the air conditioning not work, but the windows would not come down. We almost fried.
Still we have fond memories of the car. My wife and I had our first date on the Blue Ridge Parkway in the car. We were head over heels in love then, and we have managed to keep the flame burning all these years through six moves up and down the east coast.
When my mother died at the age of 94 in 2004, she willed the car to my son, who is a Reston resident.
Somehow I could not see the car with the beautifully redone paint job sitting along the side of North Shore, but it was his car, and I was willing to help him make it happen. It turned out that he did not want to see the car relegated to the hazards of North Shore parking either.
We moved heaven and earth to get it titled to him, overcoming numerous challenges. In fact the registration folks had never seen a title that old. Even after that we eventually decided that it was impossible to get insurance and tags on car that was destined to stay in North Carolina with an owner in Northern Virginia.
I was still living in Roanoke, VA and taking care of the car from Virginia was still a challenge.
Last fall we moved to Cape Carteret, North Carolina. Sometime around the first of the year, I decided that selling real estate in North Carolina with Virginia plates probably was not a good idea even though we still have our main residence in Virginia.
We registered my car in North Carolina and started figuring out how to get insurance on the Mercedes which was still residing in Mount Airy and making secret trips around a neighborhood to keep the motor and moving parts from seizing up.
Last week we picked up the tag in Morehead City and brought it back to Virginia with us in the hope that we might find a reason to visit Mount Airy this trip.
Over the weekend we found out that my wife's Aunt was sick. Since she is approaching eighty, a quick visit was in order. Knowing the battery likely needed replacing, I picked up a new battery at Advance Auto. By five pm on this past Monday, I had the Mercedes tagged and parked by Airmont Florist on Pine Street, just up the road from our home place which has become the popular B&B, Sobotta Manor.
Steve, the owner of Airmont, had also provided a home for our Big Red Bubble Previa which did spend a few winters in Reston as a back-up car when I was flying to California on a regular basis. The Previa was like a tank and already had 180,000 miles rolled up when she took a respite from her travels and lived on North Shore for a winter or two.
Before I parked the Mercedes 450SE in Steve's garage, I took her out on the 52 by-pass to blow the soot out. She climbed effortlessly to seventy miles per hour and seemed to want to head to the Parkway. It brought back memories of a different time and place when Cars had a little more personality.
We finished the day with a Big Moe dinner at Odell's Drive-in & Sandwich Shop after we had taken the obligatory drive down Main Street. Then we headed up the mountain where we found Fancy Gap, rainy but without fog.