You Can Love a Car Too Much: The White Stallion

When I first met Jimmy over a decade ago he was rolling in a White ’89 Honda Civic Sedan. His parents, who are Greek in every sense of the word, were the original owners. There are actually pictures of little Jimmy only 5 years old sitting in the front seat of the Honda pretending to drive. His parents kept it in pristine condition from 1988 until 1998 when Jimmy first started to drive….and we all know how rough 16 year old boys are on their first car. By the time she was 20 she had sagged so badly that the mechanics at Honda asked if Jimmy had had the car professionally lowered. Jimmy & his Dad, Leo, had kind of an unnatural love for that car that I wouldn’t be able to understand until after she had driven her last stretch of highway and slowly rolled to a stop forever in May of 2008.

During her lifetime she had endured 1 headlight fire, 3 break-ins, four stolen “H” emblems, three smashed driver’s side windows, two 16 year old drivers, 2 broken interior locks, 28 speeding tickets and 14 accidents. Yes, 14. You may recall my first “Have a Laugh” where I told you about my limited driving experiences. I only contributed to one of those 14 with my bumper scuff. One was a hit and run that practically tore off the whole front end of the car (to this day I always figured Jimmy & Leo had someone at SGI on the payroll because that car should have been written off at least three times and never was). One was a lady that wasn’t paying attention and backed into us in a parking lot…and the rest were the combined collaboration of the Kounios family.

Here are the highlights:

1. The first week they had the car his mom forgot to put the car in park and it rolled forward into a brick wall.
2. On a slippery winter day several years ago somehow both Jimmy & Leo managed to get into an accident on the same day, on the same side of the car only hours apart. They thought it was pretty funny. Like father, like son.
3. After a school Dance Jimmy and I wanted some food. So we pulled into a McDonalds (we were 16 & 18 so that was “food” to us). While we were driving we had noticed a funny burning smell and thought it was coming from outside the car. Upon my approach to the door of the “restaurant” I realized I had forgotten my wallet at home. We turn around to head back to the car. As I pass by my side I notice the headlight is on fire. FIRE!? Jimmy pops the hood and stares at the fire unsure of what to do. The car beside us sees the fire, puts their car in drive and moves over three spots from us and puts the car in park…to watch. I take off running towards the McDonalds again and run into three strangers explain very calmly and clearly the situation at hand: “FIRE! HEADLIGHT! HONDA! BOYFRIEND’S CAR! OVER THERE!” One of the guys jogs into the restaurant and the other one follows me back to the Honda. He proceeds to gather as much spit as possible in his mouth and then put it out with one clean shot.
4. On one of our drives back from Calgary we noticed our left signal light was making a funny sound when Jimmy used it. We thought this was odd but figured it was no more than a burnt out bulb. However it seems like the more people we pass the more weird looks we’re getting. We pull in to a gas station to refuel and I see Jimmy standing at the front of the car looking really confused. I get out and follow his gaze. There, in our signal light is a hunk of wood jammed into what used to be the bulb socket. Jimmy says “Huh. I thought I hit something on the highway on the way out of Calgary.” So the Sask. Hillbilly’s were driving around AB with a giant piece of wood protruding out of the headlights as if we had rammed through a picket fence to get out of the province. Nice.
5. By the time we had been broken into for the third time our stereo no longer worked and the car was on its last remaining miles. No one ever had to smash the window to get in since the old 80’s Honda keys worked on all Honda's of that make or a coat hanger would do the trick too. So usually we’d just get in the car (the doors would already be unlocked for us) kick the dash back into place and drive away. However this time they managed to steal the broken Sony stereo, our car emergency kit and all of the bottles and cans Jimmy had saved up in the trunk. I remember for days afterward he’d mutter about the bottles and cans. He was pretty choked about those recyclables. He said there was at least $30 in bottles/cans sitting in the trunk and that he wanted them back. At one point Jimmy mentioned staking out SARCAN’s looking for bags that were similar to the ones he had….but I don’t think he ever followed through with that.

It’s been nearly 2 years since we had the White Stallion and even though our new car is far superior to the Honda in every aspect, we still miss her rattling windows, the snow scraping on the bottom of the car so violently it feels like it’s going to rip open the car and most of all we miss her old car smell.


Check the link in the side bar to see the White Stallion Video that we put together several years ago. It's a fan favorite.