I was sixteen, making $7.25 at a part time job. After a few months of saving I had $1,500 to buy a car. I had only one reservation, it had to be like nothing else in the school parking lot. No Ford Taurus’s, no BMW’s, no Honda Civic’s, etc. After a few weeks of my father and I checking Craigslist and investigating options, I began to lose hope in finding a good car in my price range. Finally one afternoon my father texted me “What about a Saab?”, in my price range, and met my reservation? I couldn’t pass it up! “Moss” (that’s what he’s called) was perched on a hill in Jamesville NY. I knew as soon as I got behind the wheel it was meant to be. Moss is 1996 Saab 900 S 2.3L, that only a cost me $1,000.

For that whopping $1,000 a leather interior, heated seats, a sunroof, and peppy little engine, not to mention a near flawless coat of “British Racing Green” paint. Needless to say, it kind of blew me away, and blew my friends away even more. I’d never driven anything like, and it doesn’t compare to anything else to date.

I don’t think the rest of my high school career would’ve been the same without Moss. There are so many stories I could tell of the shenanigans we got into together! Like how after my Jr. prom a friend and I got into a “street race” at 2 AM with another Saab, all in good fun of course. Or how, in order to transport friends home from school, they’d go four wide in the back seat and two in the trunk! Or the time the rear drum brake innards disintegrated and locked the wheel up at 50 MPH. Yeah, Moss didn’t come without kinks. The driver side window never stays in its track, the interior lights don’t work, nor does the gauge cluster, etc.

Moss broke down often, even preventing me from bringing it my freshman year of college in Buffalo. The following summer my father and I made the needed repairs together as we often did. Fixing Moss myself gave me a great appreciation for Saab as well as raised some questions. Like why is the alternator mounted in most inaccessible place possible?

Once Moss did make it to Buffalo I immediately regretted it. Syracuse (my hometown) had rough winters, but Buffalo’s were ungodly. The road salt ate through the car like never before, I cracked one of my rims on a pothole, and the whole under body started to crumble rapidly. But Moss wouldn’t surrender and neither would I! Moss got me through college and even outlasted the girlfriend that repeatedly insisted I get rid of him. At the end of this past summer I packed up Moss and drove to Atlanta, my current home. However after a few weeks Moss started having issues of various ilks, and I started to seriously worry about the underbody rot. So I took this opportunity to look for a new car. Or should I say an old car? For an unbelievable price I got a nearly mint condition 1997 Saab 900 S 2.3L. So Moss is now a “parts” car, although so far I’ve only taken the cigarette lighter. And Moss still runs and drives, at least once a week around the storage facility he’s kept in.

There’s so much more I could say about my Moss. I think the best thing I can say though, is that Moss has never been a car to me. It’s been somewhere quiet to clear my head, a place to have deep conversations with friends, a way to escape, and a way to get me from A, to B 99% of the time. And above all a friend, that could always make me smile. And now a journey begins with my new Saab, I can’t wait to see what it has in store for me!