It’s hard to feel cool behind the wheel of a nerd-mobile

I’m feeling a little iffy about my new car. It’s an OK car, better than a lot of the heaps in which I’ve risked my life over the years. But I’m just not sure it’s me.

I won’t be taking delivery for a couple weeks yet; it’s my sweetie’s old car and I have to wait for her to buy a new one. She needs something bigger for her retail business, so I’m stuck with her Beetle.

A Bug, man! Next to a hot pink, Malibu Barbie Corvette, the girliest car to ever roll off an assembly line.

Worse still, it’s white, my least favorite car color (number one, black; red, number two; white, somewhere below chartreuse and taupe). Lori’s even decorated the thing with cute, girly decals. Decals! Girly ones!

If I were in fourth grade, this car would get me beat up daily.

Frankly, I’m not sure I’m man enough to drive the thing without first putting on dark glasses and a hoodie. It’s just not a car I want to be seen in.

My Ford truck was. It was big, black, beautiful and had tires the size of a roller rink. When I drove that truck I felt like the illegitimate love child of John Wayne and Arnold Schwarzenegger. It was the kind of vehicle that makes a man want to crush beer cans on his forehead!

I’ve also driven a few red, mid-life crises sports cars over the years. Behind the wheel of one of these, I feel like Steve McQueen. Cool. A chick magnet. (Although, in my case, the kind of magnet that repels rather than attracts.)

During poor years — pretty much any time I’m between wives — I tend to drive wrecks of questionable legal lineage. My last really dangerous vehicle, the Death Van, was, believe me, aptly named. But even that had a certain lowlife Cheech-and-Chong-I-just-don’t-give-a-damn hippie charm to it.

Not so the Bug. It is cute. It is sensible. It is good on gas and mechanically sound.

Every time I climb behind the wheel of the Bug I feel I should be cruising to a Trader Joe’s to pick up tofu and raw goat’s milk cheese. Like I should be doing yoga, reading self-help books, writing bad poetry.

It just ain’t me.

But I’ll buy it from my sweetie so she can buy an SUV or pickup or whatever she needs to move her art from studio to shoppe. I just hope driving it doesn’t get me beat up by a group of fourth-graders.

mtaylor@staffordgroup.com

(616) 548-8273