My First Car - Personal Essay

mohamed keita

It was a hot summer day in the city of brotherly love (Philadelphia). I was with my dad and my little brother who kept nagging about the ninety degree weather. We were so exhausted from waiting for one hour until the right car was ready to be auctioned. We were at the Philadelphia Parking Authority auction lot. I was so enthusiastic that I was going to have a car, that I can call my own, not my mom's minivan nor my dad's dodge charger. This was a reward from my parent because I was going to graduate High School before I turned seventeen. The car that I ended up getting was my fantasies car, a year 2000 BMW 740i. This was made me think that life would only get better. Life did get better but only for a while.

It was a nice calm Saturday, my dad woke me up at six o'clock in the morning, which I thought was very unusual. He started telling me that my uncle had purchase a nice crystal blue 2002 Nissan Maxima from a local auction. He later tells me that he and my mom have been thinking that since I was graduating High School I will need a car, and he was thinking that we should go to the same auction and browse. Having heard of this auction from a friend, I swiftly rose off the bed and went to the PPA website that had the car listings, dates and the event location. Going down the car listing I was disappointed that the entire car listed was either old are not quite the fit for me. When I was a instance away from closing the web page, I saw my three favorite letters put together (BMW). I yelled out to my dad and told him to come quick. After seeing the car, he made me less eager about the car when he replies “Mohamed you know that there will be hundreds of eager buyers ready to buy that car next Tuesday”. Even though what he said made sense, there was still part of me that wanted that car badly. Tuesday could not have come any quicker but when it did I was so eccentric, that I woke up before sunrise. I was so happy that I woke up my brother who is so annoying, to accompany us. When we arrived there I could not believe my eyes instead of my dad's estimated guess of hundreds of people there were only about thirty, most of them looked like they were accompanying the real buyers. My guess of the reason why there so little people must be because of the scorching hot summer day. After all the vehicles I did not like were sold, the BMW came roaring down the lane all the way to where the audience was. I remember the guy that usually talk really fast actually took his time to describe this luxurious car, with the main feature stainless steel wheels, maximum speed 160 miles per hour, leather interior, and etc....the bid started at 2,000 dollars. It was intense at the beginning but my dad kept on bidding. When it got to 5,000 dollar it was between my dad and some young fellow that was only a little bit older than me. The bid started to rise in increments of 500 dollars, when it got to 7,000 my dad was ready to give up. The fast talker said” Going once to the guy in the red shirt (the young guy) going twice”. My dad intervened by raising his hand the fast talker repeated “ going one to the tall man, going twice... SOLD to the tall man”. I was so happy that I taught it was a dream. After paying for the car at the final price of 7,500 dollars and waiting for the insurance and clearance title for about a month I was ready to drive my car. Life was fun and easy

My life had been flipped, I remember passing Broad and Olney SEPTA station and reminiscing about the days I used to take the public transportation. The best thing about owning a car was that the lady's treated me differently. I was able to go on more dates, not to the local plaza but dates in New Jersey and New York. The car made me so free to do more things. I even worked for a