The naming of vehicles is time-honored tradition. It gives interest and color to our travel. Ships have been given names for centuries. Pilots in war-time gave names to their planes. Space ships have names. Think how much the telling of our history is enriched by the phrase, “the Eagle has landed.”
I suggest that giving a name to a car will enhance the experiences (or at least the telling of the story in years to come) you will have in your car. Imagine how much color it would add to say, “I was barrelling down the levee road, doing eighty-five in the ‘Orange Tank,’” or “I pulled up in front of her parents’ house in my trusty Camaro, ‘Lothario.’”
I’d like to sahre the story of how I came to name and later rename one of my own cars. A few years ago, I bought a 1955 Cadillac sedan. It was painted a dour, dark Arlington green, listed slightly to the port side, and showed many signs of having lived a full life, including a Fred-Flinstone-style emergency braking option (…think about it).
When I first took it to my mechanic, I overheard him refer to the car as “el barco” to his Spanish-speaking employees. He didn’t know thatg I’d had a couple of years of Spanish in college, and that I knew “el barco” meant “the ship.” I laughed and told him I understood. He was a little embarrassed and quickly apologized. I told him there was no need, that it was perfect. I told my wife about it, and she agreed. Thereafter the car was no longer “the Cadillac,” which just seemed pretentious anyway. It was now “El Barco!”
Over the next couple of years, “El Barco’s” engine was rebuilt; so was the suspension. Rust holes were repaired. It got new upholstery. Stainless was polished. Bumpers were rechromed, and it got a beautiful new, two-tone paint job, a light “mist green” for the body and a dazzling “arctic white for the roof.” The car looked much less heavy, and its performance and handling was a lot less ship-like.
“El Barco” just didn’t fit anymore. Now, in the maritme world, it’s permissable to rename a ship after it has been refitted. I decided to follow that tradition and think of a new name. It didn’t take long. I decided to name it in honor of grandmother who drove a car exactly like it in the fifties and early sixties. I rechristened it “Trudy.” The name fits like a glove - evocative of the era when the car was built and significant of family history.
It’s so much nicer to say, “Let’s take Trudy,” instead of “Let’s take the Cadillac,” or “let’s take the green car.”
And as for the gender of the name, vessels are always female even if the names are masculine. The USS Abraham Lincoln and the HMS Prince of Wales, for example, are still referred to as “she.”
I think there are two reasons people tend to overlook naming their automobiles: 1: Cars, unlike ships and space craft are mass produced - in the millions, and therefore are seen as common and unworthy of names. 2: Auto companies name cars for us. Both of these reasons are, I believe, misguided. Afterall, children are mass produced by the millions every year, and they pretty much all look and act alike at first. Yet we name them because we know better. Soon they will develop personalities, and be unique. And why should we let car companies tell us (and our friends and neighbors for that matter) how we should think of our cars (and by extension ourselves)? No! I say let us break the bonds of conformity and, even worse, anonymity. Let our cars reflect the uniqueness of the adventures we will have in them. Let us name or vehicles!
