Author’s note: Friday I sold my 1989 MBZ 300 SE after 16 years of ownership. As a tribute to a car that meant so much to me over the years, her story is repeated here today.
(Originally posted 10/14/2012) There’s something I must make clear to you before proceeding with this story: I am an idiot in any situation involving a woman. One-hundred percent of the time, I will follow a great pair of legs into hell (or a Mercedes dealership, as the case may be) with both eyes open. With that understood, let’s continue.
I would never have considered buying a Mercedes at all were it not for Lori, a freelance graphic artist at our ad agency and a dead ringer for Xena, Warrior Princess. Lori drove a buttercup-yellow 240D and loved all things Mercedes. To my astonishment, she agreed to accompany me to our agency Christmas party, after which we started dating.
I don’t have a shot of my ex, but here’s my EX.
Don’t get me wrong: I loved everything about my Hampshire Green 1990 Accord EX except the motorized seat/shoulder belt that kept knocking lit cigars out of my mouth; aside from that, it was a fantastic little car that gave me more than my money’s worth of faithful service. After nine years and 215,000 (mostly trouble-free) miles of ownership, I knew the end was near. My car was in desperate need of a replacement transmission, A/C compressor and ignition back-switch, and a new transmission alone cost more than it was worth. True to form, I soon entered full-idiot mode and began shopping for a used S-Class to replace the Accord and impress Xena.
I first saw Brigitte on the lot of a local MBZ dealership, where she went by her birth name of 300 SE. At first, I wasn’t interested; as long as I was making a Honda-to-Mercedes long jump, I figured on going all-in with a 560 SEL. Still, I had to admire the Smoke Silver beauty that sat in front of me, looking every bit as elegant (and nearly as pristine) as the day she’d left Stuttgart some 11 years earlier.
I agreed to a test drive, mostly to find an excuse to let the salesman know I wasn’t interested. I settled into in the driver’s seat—admittedly more of a driver’s throne–and then shut the door, an elegantly weighted piece that closed with all the authority of a Mosler safe. As I pulled into traffic, my thoughts quickly shifted from solid as a vault to slow as a stone: it felt like the old girl’s weight and turning circle were more appropriate to something with 16 wheels and hydraulic brakes. You didn’t so much steer this thing as change direction.
On the other hand, our leisurely pace allowed plenty of time to look around the cabin, and I noticed that wherever my gaze fell, something had been done perfectly. After more than a decade and 68,000 miles of driving, every switch still operated with NASA precision; every piece of wood trim still glowed with a rich luster.
It may be true that a test drive mostly seals a purchase decision, but this one actually changed my thinking. As a kid in Illinois, my greatest automotive aspiration was a Cadillac or Lincoln, but suddenly I saw them as mere Chevys and Fords hiding under an expensive skin; instead, here was a car to be taken on its own terms: It was not slow, but stately, a doyenne comporting herself with grace and dignity. Although I became a Mercedes owner that day, I would still have much to learn about the timelessness of great design and the elegance of painstaking craftsmanship. In fact, I was not all that upset when Lori dumped me a few weeks later. (Should I have held out for a 560?) After all, I still had Brigette,
which I’d named in tribute to another gracefully aging beauty, Ms. Bardot. (Seen here in her prime)
Those of you who’ve gone the used-German route know that it’s like sending a kid through college: eventually, you simply accept the writing and justifying of check after check. Yes, I had expected the Mercedes service visits to cost more than the Honda’s, but it did surprise me to find that they include not only a complimentary wash but also full-service condescension and intimidation:
Me: I’ve got a small oil leak. Could you please check it?
Service Manager: Nozzing is designed to leeg. Vat did you do?
Still, I didn’t care. I eased my financial pain by occasionally looking up the stratospheric price of a new S-Class, an amount of money that made mine a relative bargain in comparison; I also embraced a philosophy familiar to many an owner of an old MBZ: Well, I’m in it this far…
Many months and thousands of dollars later, I’d brought every mechanical and cosmetic aspect up to spec. During the week, I usually drove my beloved Protegé5, which is to the SE as a Jack Russell is to a St. Bernard. But on the occasional weekend when I actually had a bit of disposable income, it was off to Palm Springs. The area’s Mid-century Modern architecture and Scotch-and-cigars Rat Pack vibe seemed like the proper setting for both me and the car to spend a Saturday.
In August 2006, two days into some much-needed R&R in Scottsdale, came a call from California: My 85-year-old father had broken his hip and was undergoing emergency surgery. The tough old Minnesota native survived the surgery, but not by much, and would never again walk on his own. A nursing home was out of the question—he starved himself and threw tantrums at every one we tried—so I took him home to Apple Valley and hired a live-in. Literally. As in a caregiver who didn’t drive.
At least once a week over the next three years, I made the trip from Irvine to Apple Valley to do Dad’s grocery shopping and take him to medical appointments. I brought the Benz, since it offered easier ingress and egress than my Protégé. Besides, whenever he rode in it he’d always smile and tell me that it was such a nice car and I’d better hang on to it, and I always assured him I would. With time came changes: It wasn’t long before every time I came up he’d exclaim, “You got a new car!”; I’d simply say that no, Dad, it’s the same one I’ve had for years. At first I was annoyed that this exchange repeated every few minutes; eventually, I became grateful that he still recognized me.
On June 28, 2009, Brigitte and I drove him and his caregiver to Outback for an 88th birthday lunch. Nine days later he was gone. We buried him in Riverside on the hottest day of July. It was not a short drive, and the price of premium fuel was summer-vacation high, but there was never a question that Brigette must make one last trip for Dad. Following the hearse, I could almost hear him say that this was a nice car, and to hang on to it.
Why, Lord, why?
On a Sunday night seven months later, I was driving home from the Desert Concours. Traffic on the 91 Freeway is always heavy, but is especially bad on Sundays as motorists return from Las Vegas or the desert and bring it to a halt. I was at a dead stop at the end of a long and motionless line of westbound vehicles when it happened in a flash: I heard the squeal of tires, saw blinding light in the rear view mirror and felt the impact of a sickening, jarring thud. As I prepared to pull off the freeway, I saw the other driver’s silver Range Rover speed away in the carpool lane. He was apprehended a couple of miles up the freeway, but I had really hit (or rather, was hit by) the Trifecta: Rear-ended by an uninsured motorist with a suspended license who fled the scene. It was just my luck to get slammed by the only damn Range Rover in Southern California not driven by a studio executive.
Obviously, the car had been a big part of my life, and not merely in terms of time and trouble and expense. Unfortunately, to my insurance company it was just another old car worth maybe $2,700.00, tops. I could either take that amount in exchange for my car, or accept $2,500 and retain the salvage title. The choice wasn’t hard. I knew that parting out the car would make the most sense, but remember what I said about me and women? Had I known at the time how hard it would be to finding a willing body shop, I might well have taken the $2,700 and run. Since the car couldn’t be driven, I shot plenty of photos of the damage; with prints in hand, I proceeded to make the rounds of local body shops. Since no sane body man will provide an estimate without an in-person inspection, I didn’t expect one. I just wanted to find someone willing to take on the job; I did not. Not that I blame them–if I had a shop and some guy wanted me to fix an old wreck with a bent frame, I’d tell him to get back on his meds. It was but the first of many points at which I could/should have bailed, but hey, as long as I’m in it this far…
A few months before the wreck, I’d had the car painted by a couple of freelance body guys who rented space at a shop and worked when they felt like it. The job had taken a while–a long while–but I had to admit that their work was very good and their price astonishingly low. They were sick about what had happened to my car and told me to tow it in. Bent frame? No problem, they’ve straightened plenty. Tight budget? We’ll figure something out. In a hurry? Well, at least I had two out of three. And as long as I’d be paying them in cash (wink, wink), I might as well give them a chunk upfront so they can start rounding up parts. They spent more than a year on the project, but the car looked good. At last, I thought, the hard part is over. Silly me.
I don’t know how it is where you are, but trust me, it’s not easy to register a salvage vehicle (or ‘zombie’, as I call them) in California. Honestly, H.P. Lovecraft had it easier. If you like trees, please don’t read further, because this state kills a hell of a lot of them to produce the pile of forms that must be completed during the registration process. In addition to the usual Smog Certificate stuff, there are Application for Title, Headlamp and Rear Light Certificate, Brake Certificate forms and one that must be completed during the required, in-person inspection of the vehicle by a DMV officer.
If you haven’t visited a California DMV office, here’s how it works: You take a lunch and make a day of it. Yes, you poor, naive souls, appointments are available, if by ‘appointment’ you mean ‘approximate time, plus or minus two hours’. Flat tires and dead batteries aside, people out here join the AAA just to avoid having to visit the DMV for registration-related stuff. Having completed all the proper forms, I gathered them up and confidently strode into a AAA office, where I learned that the AAA doesn’t handle registrations for salvage titles. I’d just have to bite the bullet and pack a lunch.
It’s been about six months since Brigette returned home. She again looks wonderful, and I’ve been driving her once or twice a week, just to keep the juices flowing, but it’s just not the same. How much of that is psychological, I don’t know, but every passing week reveals another misaligned body gap or suspension noise I hadn’t noticed before. I still love her, but I don’t think she remembers much. Or perhaps I just remember things differently. It’s not Thomas Wolfe’s You Can’t Go Home Again as much as Leonard Cohen’s cold and very broken Hallelujah.
Anyway, that’s my story, dedicated to all of you who know that our cars are not merely metal conveyances, but things with which memories are made. We love them for the context in which they frame our lives, and for the pleasure they bring to PCH on a balmy summer night or on a snow-dusted highway on the way to a family Thanksgiving.
There is a postscript to this story: Last August, my mechanic called to give me first dibs on a ’91 560 SEL with less than 92,000 miles. He’d told me that he’s known and serviced the car since it was new, and that it was perfect in every aspect. Just to torture myself, I went over and had a look. He was right, it was absolutely magnificent, and Smoke Silver to boot! He wanted $6,500 for the car. The price was more than fair, but the timing was not; given my finances at the time, it might as well have been $65,000. A few days later he sold the car to another longtime customer, so at least I know it went to a good home.
And besides, I’m in it this far…
Masterful, Tony, and heartbreaking. There’s a cold drizzle here right now. I’m going to go stand in it to cheer up.
Great story; I feel your multiple pains. BTW, “Imperialist” is Tony LaHood, our behind-the-scenes Copy Editor, who polishes our mangled drafts. This is his debut on the front page…well done.Tony.
Having lived through (and participated in) the Great Mercedification of California, your story is probably a metaphor for that era. It was a huge wave, and the social aspect was obviously huge. But in addition to that, it exposed folks to the charms (and the service bills) of these superbly built cars.
The 300SE is an interesting version of the W126, as it didn’t appear until 1986, since it used the new six cylinder engine from the W124 300E. And it effectively replaced the 300SD as the “entry level” S-Class, since diesels were now suddenly “out”, and smooth and powerful gas engines were “in”.
These S-Classes are really more comparable to more recent E-Class cars, both in their size and relative affordability.
Tony mentions how heavy this car felt when he first drove it; that’s a common experience, but not due to the actual weight. The W126 was a paragon of light weight construction; the 300SE weighed only 3360 lbs. But the weight of the steering and controls, and the Mercedes throttle linkage meant one had to put one’s foot (and hands) into the task at hand, especially if one wanted to hustle them.
I had one of these as a driver for a while (don’t ask how) and the car was far from slow. Sure, it didn’t come off the line the 560 does but once it gut up to like 20 km/h it really took off. On the highway it ran beautifully and the car did feel light once you got it know it. The best part is the 300SE didn’t drink gas at the prodigious rate the 560 did.
I loved the weight of the steering on these cars as you always feel you are in control. The steering on must modern cars is much too light.
> The steering on must modern cars is much too light.
As a person who often has to do full-lock turns at standstill or a crawl, I respectfully disagree. The high speed behaviour leaves much to be desired, but that is due to poor feedback, not poor stability. Modern (electric) power steering cars also track straight and turn perfectly.
I tend to split the difference with you both. Yes, at 110 mph, I’ll take the Benz. In tight traffic or a parking lot, I’d take a bit more boost.
That’s what you get today in a high-end BMW. Speed-sensitive Variable Boost power steering. This tech will someday trickle down to cars you and I can afford, I’m sure. Soon.
I’m a big fan of the “effort” required to steer and accelerate a W124 and W126. It took a little getting used to when I got my E, but after a few minutes it felt totally natural and controllable, now I miss it when I drive other cars.
There’s something I must make clear to you before proceeding with this story: I am an idiot in any situation involving a woman.
Really? I thought I was the only one. 😛
(I’m in it this far) and here you will stay. We get hung up on a car and it’s just like being hung up on one of the fairer sex. We cannot let go. Just like women they will let go of you but you brought her back to life.
Good job with the story. Good job with the restoration? Time will tell.
I enjoyed that story a lot, especially good with a hot cup of morning coffee. The first poster mentioned that there was a cold drizzle where he is. Today, where I am, it will be hotter than the hinges on the gates that lead straight to Hell. At least my morning read of CC was good. Looking forward to more stories from this author.
Great story (I laughed, I cried), beautifully written, distilling the emotional raison d’etre of CC. Looking forward to more!
“There’s something I must make clear to you before proceeding with this story: I am an idiot in any situation involving a woman…”
OK, add me to the list.
“At first I was annoyed that this exchange repeated every few minutes; eventually, I became grateful that he still recognized me…”
When my mother passed this February, she hadn’t recognized me in five years…
May they all requiescant in pace.
Wonderful story that hits too close to home. About three years ago, my grandfather fell and fractured his hip. When you’re in your eighties, it’s never just the hip, and he steadily declined after that, but my grandmother and extended family moved mountains so he could stay in the home he loved so much. The last time I visited with him, he could no longer feed himself and could barely speak. I wasn’t sure if he even knew who I was, but when I said goodbye, he slowly reached out, offered me a firm handshake, looked me in the eyes and mustered “You take good care of yourself.” He knew.
We buried him this past Friday.
Cars have passed through my life in very much the same way women have: Too much overanalyzing and dithering before I let them in, only to cast them aside much too quickly and foolishly. There’s a few I regret not buying/asking out, and more than a few I regret selling/dumping. Such is life.
The more you love something, the harder it is to let it go. It truly is better to have loved and lost than to have never have loved at all. The pain of loss is harder to bear, but its a pain tempered by the joys of the past. Regret is a much emptier pain. Loss is inevitable; Life is too short for regret.
It seems trite to “love” or “miss” a car, but then cars are often more than inanimate transportation. They are milestones in our lives – symbols of who we were and who we loved at a given point in time. Selling a car hurts not because you’re losing the car, but because you’re losing the physical connection to people and memories it represents.
In recent months, I’ve been kind of down on my myself, wallowing in what I’ve done and haven’t done in my relationships, career, etc. Perhaps that’s just twentysomething malaise, but the last couple of days have been a wake up call. Time is fleeting; Take a chance while you can. On a car. On a girl. On your dreams. There will always be regrets, but without risks there will only be regrets.
Great car, Tony. The W126 is timeless and one of my favorites. Whatever you decide to do with it, rest assured it’ll always stay with you.
“Curbside Catharsis.” Wow, how apt. But enough of my rambling. The woods outside my window look particularly beautiful right now. I think I’ll skip football this afternoon, have a beer on my patio and enjoy the fall leaves blowing in the wind.
Beautiful sentiments, beautifully written.
Spot on the vehicle and what it represents –the memories and eras they represent. Within the past month, I have had to rid myself of a 90 LX Mustang, a car I purchased new (the only one up to now) right after obtaining my bachelor’s degree. That car was my daily driver for almost 20 years until time caught up w/ it, it never left me in the lurch—and if it wasn’t for a pending relocation to fla. I might have poured the 7G that it desperately needed at the end. I have half a million pictures of that car in thousands of different locations and all of them represent a time/place that I cannot get back to……
I much ‘enjoyed’ the image of the final handshake with grandfather, profound. I am certain that moment will stay with you forever.
A beautifully told tale. “I’m in it this far . . .” – how often I have uttered those words. And I also understand the anguish of a beautifully maintained older car that is mangled in an accident. I lost a 96 Odyssey this way. Unfortunately, a front hit to a fwd vehicle. And right after the big timing belt/water pump outlay.
Your rememberances of your father are touching. I cannot think of my dad without remembering the hours spent in my Olds 98 driving to visit him every other week for about the last year of his life. Unfortunately, he was shut in by then and never got to ride in it.
I hope that we will get to read more of your experiences.
This too, reminds me of the final months I had with my dad. I bought the LeSabre a few months before he passed. He raved about that car. He got to drive it-once. He said it was great. My mom and I drove it to the funeral, and made the trip to Ypsilanti to the cemetery with it. When winter approached I put it in the back of the garage and didn’t drive it till spring. Every time I looked at it, or took it out, it just reminded me of dad when he was so sick. I loved that car, I really did, but the memories were just too much, so it had to go. I’m hoping it’s in Florida by now.
On a brighter note, the Mercedes looks lovely, and this was a great story, thanks for sharing!
“And besides, I’m in it this far…”
All I can hear is the Econ professor saying, “SUNK COSTS ARE SUNK COSTS.” And then all of us fools replying in Homer Simpson’s voice, “Stupid economists…”
Even funnier because I was an econ major in college!
“But I’ve got to keep driving it to get my money back out of it!”
ditto. ugh :/
Very well done.
Just one OCD nit: that buttercup car is a 300D; 240Ds had black trim under the tail lamps and steel wheels with body-painted covers befitting its lower status. And oh god was it slow… even with the standard 4-speed stick it was a hazard. I never drove one with the available automatic, which must have been even worse.
On the lighter side, I dated a young woman a few times (1979) who referred to my 76 Dodge as an old gas guzzler. I’m glad that I still have the car, rather than her.
For a couple years, I dated Brigitte’s twin: a 1989 300SE, smoke silver with the same tan interior. Tony, you have more patience for the girls’ quirks than I did, since we broke up after 2 years.
But I’m still in a w126 state of mind: when I saw the picture of Brigitte’s rear window’s lower corner, my first thought wasn’t “look at that panel gap.” No, I said to myself, “that’s fantastic–not even a hint of delamination!”
The emotional attachments that we develop with cars are truly extraordinary. The good ones end up being members of the family, and the bad ones? Well, never mind about the bad ones. I’m glad to hear that I’m not the only one who gives his car a name, a habit that I inherited from my parents. Mom, in particular was in the habit of talking to her car as though it was some sort of highly intelligent pet. As I recall, the female protagonist in Stephen King’s book Christine uttered the line, “Cars are girls.” Well, not strictly true. Most cars are girls, and I suppose that most trucks are boys, but I’ve always been of the opinion that a young man’s first car is generally a boy, since your first car tends to be your partner in crime. I guess my Dad agreed with me, since his first car was a ’37 Chevy named “Louey.”
“Most cars are girls, and I suppose that most trucks are boys…”
I laugh thinking of how the Imp crosses back and forth over that line. When talking about her, driving her, enjoying her company, she’s a she. When working under the hood, which inevitably involves rusted !@#$% bolts I can’t reach without bleeding, I’m more likely to find it a mean dirty old man. C’mon, ya bastard! 🙂
So, instead of “Get outta my yard, you damn kids,” I imagine it’s something like, “quit poking around under my hood! Can’t ya see I’m tired? If you were my age, you’d have some rust on ya, too. Damn kids…”
Ha! You nailed it. Joke’s on me, I also came off the line in ’73. We’re getting old and cranky together!
Great story; great human interest quotient.
But…as I’ve grown older, and my paycheck has retreated faster than my hairline (I’m old and fat but I still have my pretty blond hair!)…I’ve come to accept automobiles as, more and more, utilitarian appliances. Sure, I can appreciate the solid feeling of a Teutonic machine; I can imagine piloting a car costing more than the GDP of some third-world countries and feel the envious gaze of women on me…
…but it just doesn’t pay. In other words, if you have to ask the price, you can’t afford it. If the repair bills on your Daimler steamship make you think, just by pondering, you know. You’re paying too much.
The price of cars has risen exponentially; and with airbags and the cost of replacing them, and the liability of not doing so, it’s way, way too easy to have a car totaled. And as you’ve seen, laws requiring insurance are no guarantee that the idiot who hits you, is going to have any.
I’ve decided. Cars being an appliance, when choosing one, I put on the bookkeeper’s green eyeshade. No other factors need be considered, other than usefulness, purchase price, durability and resale value.
And M-B, along with the American luxury brands, don’t cut it.
I agree with you completely. Cars are money pits and my main object is driving at a reasonable cost. Cars are so darned good nowadays that even a ten year old example can give many years of trouble free service. This can be done at fractions of the cost of driving anything new. You can get a good driver for $5000 and a really good one for $10,000. For that ten grand, you are going to get a much better can than a bottom end econobox.
> …the solid feeling of a Teutonic machine…
Paul just revealed its actually the power(less) steering. 🙂
I have several vintage cars. I’m keeping the most rare and valuable ones for myself and flipping the rest. Although the “flippers” are gonna be my retirement fund, I know it’s gonna hurt watching them being driven or carted off to their owners’ new homes.
Congratulations on a great debut, Mr. LaHood! You’ve not only owned and driven one of the most elegant automotive designs ever, for all its mechanical and ergonomic shortcomings; but also splendidly segued into an emotional, tragic, but simultaneously heart-warming personal story. One of the best articles on CC thus far.
I’ve never owned or driven a Mercedes. But the feature car from the (80’s?) still looks current and beautiful. Anyone driving the car would appear affluent, in my opinion. $ 2,700 as a totalled car would bring tears. That 91, at $ 6,500 would be a great ride.
Of course, repairs would cost a fortune. A few repair bills would have me regretting the purchase.
What an absolutely terrific story. I laughed, and cried. Thank you.
I really enjoyed reading the story of your 300SE and life. So many aspects of it hit home for me.
Awesome story – really made my Saturday morning coffee time worthwhile 🙂 And I can sympathise, having done the “I’m in it this far…” two years ago.
In 2009 I bought a 1997 C35 Nissan Laurel diesel. Paid NZ$5,500, which was good as the dealer had just spent NZ$3,500 rebuilding the engine after a timing belt mishap – and the car came came with a 3 yr/100,000km warranty.
6 months later the heater core blew, which cost the warranty company $1,300 to repair. So with $5.5K of my own and nearly $5k of other peoples’ money invested in it, I was gutted to rear-end another car… My insurance company immediately wrote off my Laurel, as my panel damage came to $4K. But I figured “Well, there’s been so much spent on the mechanicals, they should last forever…”, so I took the payout, bought the ‘wreck’ back and spent the payout having the car fixed and repainted. It looked great and ran as well as ever, and I just knew nothing else would go wrong. And then the steering rack died and wasn’t covered under the warranty. So, I though “I’m in it this far…” and spent $800 having the rack rebuilt…
Now, 3 years after buying it, it’s about to turn over 300,000km on the odo and still runs like new. The transmission could use a freshen-up, but that’s fine, because if I’m in it this far…
On a serious note, commiserations about your Dad. It’s always hard when parents age and pass. He must have so appreciated your regular visits 🙂
Fantastic telling of a moving story, thanks Tony.
Really enjoyed your debut story! I Iiterally gasped in shock when I saw the picture of the damage. I’ve felt (and STILL do!) the same way about cars; my first car (1970 Charger) was totalled in an accident. My 86 year old dad is starting a descent into short term memory loss and mild dementia, so I can emphathize. Looking forward to seeing more from you! 🙂
A very good story and well told indeed .
My Brother has _two_ Mercedes W0126’s , a 1981 300SD and a 19?? 300SDL with the 6 cylinder Diesel engine .
Both are very nice cars , I’d not have an S Klasse Mercedes my ownself .
I hope any and all here know how special it is to have a parent you’re close to ~ treasure this gift and treat them well , never forget to visit them and say ‘ thank you for the memories ‘ as they’ll be gone before you know it .
-Nate
I really enjoyed reading this piece Tony. It must have been an extremely emotional process writing this. I’m glad you got some good years out of Brigitte and I’m sure the memories of your father has something to do with your continued committment to her.
Beautiful and bittersweet story. My parents are enamoured of my W116; for a car that really cost peanuts they still draw the full measure of glamour from riding in it. Sorry to read about your father, and glad you managed to enjoy some recognition from him as things progressed.
The sunk-cost effect brought you 16 years of a styling ride. Priceless.
I’m a relative newbie who hadn’t “found” CC in 2012, so this is a brand-new read to me. Imperialist/Tony touches on plenty of shared experiences (automotive and otherwise), and I see many found it as hitting-home affecting as I did.
Priceless. Great story. It is amazing how much an automobile can become a part of your life.
To me, these are the true Mercedes Benz.
I can’t believe I missed this article the first time. I hate when bad things happen to nice people and I’m sorry about your Dad. That old Benz was really something. I completely understand about the oil leak and the mechanic’s response to that. Those guys are all the same!
Hoping to have good luck with my recently purchased 190E 2.6. It’s also Smoke Silver a fancy name for beige but I love it. So far so good but my driveway is getting covered in oil drops. I wonder what that’s gonna cost to fix because, you know, they’re not designed to do that!
PS — I looked at the date again and saw I did respond the first time. My aunt was diagnosed with cancer that week in October and I wasn’t able to say much. There was a gap in my posts from Oct. – Dec. 2012 for that reason, I had to take care of her. Miss her terribly.
Just a month ago I purchased a 1990 300SEL for a paltry $475. I was a lien sale from a tow yard. The previous owners abandoned it hundreds of miles from home.
Aside from the huge dent in the right rear door, it’s completely straight and sound. The interior is a bit dirty but otherwise in fine shape. I haven’t decided yet whether to flip it or keep it around as a future replacement for my ’95 Lexus LS400.
I went through something similar with my mother, but she did need to be in a nursing home. She did seem to know us till the end, but did not seem to have a grasp on where she was. She had always expect to live at home till the end.
I have never named any of my vehicles or gotten attached to them. I enjoy them while they are mine, and take care of them so the next owner will get a good car. I have had a few favorites.
I understand your love affair. My nightmare with my ’77 6.9 ended when I sold it and bought my ’86 420SEL it was a marvelous car, although it had the non sexy name of Mabel because she was definitely an old lady car compared to the 6.9.
Beautiful, well-written and so evocative of the cars we’ve owned. And thanks for that picture of Ms. Bardot. Whew! Too bad your budget wouldn’t allow purchasing that 560. As an owner of one I can attest to their thirstiness, but I only drive it occasionally. Repair costs may be a bit on the high side (especially if you take it to a dealer) but when you get back in it, it’s worth it; you are driving a Mercedes!
That’s why I like my 300SEL. All the luxury and prestige of a W126 sedan without the insane fuel and repair bills.
Great story. From 2010 to 2015 my Mom, cat, brother in law, Dad, and dog have all passed. Still have the ’86 Jetta they all rode in, and earlier than that a good friend and my late sister who both died at the young age of 43 also were passengers in the car. I really haven’t had to spend a lot of money keeping the car on the road, and the paint and interior have all held up well. The drivetrain is still original, doing my own repairs along with used and internet parts have been fairly inexpensive over the last 24 years. I appreciate the car more these days due to the memories it carries. Life goes on. So does old VW’s. Your 300 SE was a real beauty, glad you got so many years to enjoy a great car. Sounds like it brought joy to your Dad every time he rode in it.
Wow, great story. I’ve got an ’88 560SEL that was my uncle’s. I should name it Sisyphus because that’s what ownership of it feels like. That being said, I still love it.