QOTD: Turning Down That Ride?

It’s not good to live your life in fear, at least if you can help it. Sometimes there’s no choice but to soldier on with a stiff upper lip, hoping the bombers won’t show up again tonight, but for most of us in the Western world things are pretty okay — regardless of what your coworker posts 18 times a day on Facebook and Twitter.

Yet fear persists in more specific circumstances. One of them may involve a certain vehicle not owned by yourself, but someone you know.

There’s two ways a vehicle can strike queasy, palm-sweating fear into the heart of a mortal. First, it may be in such a state of disrepair that the floor stands a good chance of dissolving beneath you, dropping you onto the highway… if the linkages, an axle, or gas tank don’t get there first.

Or it could be that your friend/family member/coworker simple can’t handle what they bought. Big or small, muscular or wimpy, any car can be a cumbersome, too-hot-to-handle beast in the hands of someone who doesn’t trust their own skills, second-guesses their ability at every turn, or just generally couldn’t hit the side of a barn with a 10-gauge shotgun at five paces. Money and a license can open dangerous doors.

As for myself, I treasure the various tendons and bones that hold my spindly body together. I may live in Canada, but I know what becomes of a person on “disability,” and it aint the luxurious fever dream of a very online brodude who just left Radwood. Ol’ Steph needs to stay in one piece, which is why I avoid — like the plague — the two-door 2009 Hyundai Accent driven by a friend’s mother. One short drive was enough. Have you ever been in one of those things? The Grim Reaper rides shotgun, regardless of passenger count, and IIHS crash ratings bear this out. The shocking lack of….cushion…was vividly apparent during that one drive, showing just how far we’ve come in terms of passenger safety (and vehicle bloat) in recent years.

In no other vehicle, even a friend’s long-gone ’72 Super Beetle, has my head rubbed the headliner in the front seat. Oh wait — I forgot to mention the Fiat 500. Despite its four-wheel drums and a transmission held to the engine with dental floss, that old VW was still a vehicle I had no reservations about getting in. Not so with the Accent.

For some, the object of their ire may have been an early-model Pinto liftback, for obvious reasons.

Luckily, I’ve managed to avoid the kind of flayed rustbuckets that were once commonplace on highways across the continent. Thank the recession and subsequent rock-bottom interest rates for the plethora of newish vehicles on today’s roadways, even if the average age of a road-going car is still 11-plus years old. As for specific drivers, there’s a handful of people who I’d rather avoid as a chauffeur.

Over to you, B&B. You’ve all lived long and eventful lives, and dangerously fragile vehicles and Achilles-heeled drivers no doubt factored into them. Let’s hear those stories. What rides did you turn down, and why?

[Image: Hyundai]