I loved my car. It was a 2001 Audi A8, 4.2 liter, the perfect green with Luxury all the way. I bought it used with only 25,000 miles on it. All-Wheel Drive, Triptronic transmission, with a salvage title; it was in near perfect condition. The guys at work called it a ‘swimmer’ because it was taken from the edge of an insurance-designated flooded lot.

I was thrilled to be driving a car like this and enjoyed much long distance travel. In detailing the interior, deep inside a crevasse I found a paper placard. Carrying a literal watermark, it was rippled dry as a bone. It indicated that this car very likely transported dignitary types in Washington DC. For the first few months I would find some new feature that would delight to no end. The car had every state of the art option available that year and a few custom features as well. The original book value, new in 2001, was well over $65,000. Man oh man, could that thing cruise!

…

Sometimes it’s the things you don’t see that make all the difference. The side impact was severe. What would normally have been an extremely violent and likely deadly situation was diffused, literally, by crumple zones – custom crumple zones. We live in a space in time here on Earth. I’m discovering that in life we are surrounded by crumple zones.  Time is the biggest crumple zone of all. If you follow my ramblings here at TCA  you can only imagine the condition of ‘my second toe’ had it not been for crumple zones. ‘Improvement is steady’ in crumple zones.  Now, I’m ready – for all the great features of my Audi with the size and height of my pick-up truck – cream colored please.