M.I.C.: Compromising on transportation

In October of 2008 we were starting to get iffy with transportation.

I was working, I had the sorority, I had school. Clark had work, he was taking classes at the community college, he was trying to go climbing more. It was a mess. We’d be trying to take turns with the van, considering I could just walk down a hill to get to class, but with the sorority, I needed to drive, too.

On top of all that, Clark was considering attending classes at another community college that was about 30 minutes away. We needed another mode of transportation, but there was no way we could afford a car.

Clark started looking into motorcycles. I was not pleased.

I thought just a bike would do, but then realized he couldn’t ride a bike to a college thirty minutes away down the mountain on a major highway.

It wouldn’t work.

I thought maybe we could ask his parents if they could loan us a car temporarily, like my parents had done with our lovely 1998 Mercury Villager van.

They couldn’t do it.

All things were pointing to a motorcycle, but it came down to finances once again. We couldn’t afford it. There was no way possible unless we got a loan.

We looked into a loan, but a motorcycle is considered a “leisure” loan, not a transportation loan. We would need a cosigner on top of that, because we had no credit history.

We were stuck.

We went to my older sister and her husband. They were very understanding of several situations due to the fact that they were young and married as well.

They offered to lend us money with a payment plan that would have us pay it off in a year.

It was agreed on, we made a sort of contract, and we received a check to go toward a motorcycle Clark had found.

We made payments to the man as well. We gave him most of it upfront with the check from my sister and her husband, and then made payments from our bank account as time went by.

The motorcycle started being worth it. It made things a lot easier, but it didn’t ease my mind that Clark was out on a bike driving around.

I knew he was a safe driver… it was other drivers that made me nervous.

One of my sorority sister’s boyfriend got into an accident on his bike, and it made my anxiety even worse.

But, it was a good investment. It made us able to be separate and not worry about time limits and things like that. We were able to focus on what we needed to do, without worrying about if we needed to pick the other person up.

Being in school, being married and attempting to have a social life was harder than imagined. It was only going to get harder as college progressed, but finding small solutions day by day definitely made it worthwhile.