A new addition (but not that kind)

We are excited to announce that last week we welcomed a new member into our family:

This addition has been a long time coming. For the last 3 1/2 years we've been driving a 2001 Sienna, which we bought (very, very) used when we realized there was no way we could fit three carseats in either our Mazda 5 or our Ford Focus. The Sienna served us well (even though the handle broke off the driver-side sliding door two months after we bought it, and it could therefore only be opened from the inside), but at 16 years old and practically 200,000 miles it was done. I was terrified to take it in for an oil change because at this point it's never *just* an oil change, and anything it needed beyond that would almost certainly be well above the worth of the car.

We knew this day was coming. Actually, we've know it was coming pretty much since we bought the Sienna. So we had been planning and saving what we could for a while. It was both exciting and terrifying--the first time either Alex or I had bought a new car. And now I don't want to drive it because WHAT IF IT GETS DIRTY?!?!

(As a child, I hid my Easter candy in my closet and saved it until was stale because I didn't want it to be gone... I'm sure that is in no way related to my current inclination to preserve the pristine new-ness of my new car.)

So. New car--it obviously has to be named. I mean, that is obvious, right? You guys all name your cars, right? Right?

My parents named our cars when I was growing up, and Dene' and I named the cars we shared in high school and college. We had:

Max the Honda Accord

me riding in Max, circa... 1989?
I guess taking pictures of the exterior of cars wasn't such a priority
back in the days of real film that you actually had to buy and then develop...

Clarabelle the Isuzu Trooper

L-R: the Christmas tree, Dad, Dene', and I

Not pictured: Izzy the Ford minivan (Windstar maybe? all I remember was that it was convenient for road trips but NOT COOL to drive in high school)


Touzalin the sporty little Honda Civic (my favorite)

Dene' and I, first day of my senior year of high school

feeling so grown up on our very own sisters-only road trip to the Black Hills the summer after my senior year of high school

Flint the Ford Focus

Dene' and I and our friend Ember drove 16 hours for a CFO camp in Ontario (and set up our tent all by ourselves! twice!)
and it's a good thing we did, because Ember just happened to meet her husband at that camp :)

And then finally I had a car that was all mine to name without consulting anyone else: Celebrin the Mazda 5.

all packed up and off to grad school

Yes, Celebrin (kel-EH-breen). If you're thinking, "Hmm, that sounds an awful lot like the Elvish word for 'silver'" then you would be absolutely right. Once it was all up to me I was naming my cars in Elvish. As one does.

Well, we never got around to naming the Sienna for some reason. But our new Odyssey absolutely needs a name, and clearly it needs to be in Elvish (I'm open to either Quenya or Sindarin, in case you were wondering). So I've been poring over the appendices in the Silmarillion and  Lord of the Rings in an attempt to find/construct the perfect name.

So after much deliberation and many moments of frustration when I realized that I had unwittingly blended Quenya and Sindarin elements to create a name (can't have that, precious!) we finally settled on a name. Alex fully approved of the endeavor and got a say in the final decision, but I want the record to show that he did mock me throughout the entire process.

We finally settled on Durandir (du-RAHN-deer), meaning "dusk-wanderer" in Sindarin. I preferred the high-elven word for dusk, lómë, but I couldn't make any combinations work to my satisfaction. The price of being a purist, I suppose. And Alex and I agreed that having some form of wander/journey in the name of our Odyssey was too clever to pass up.

 So, tell me! Do you name vehicles? What do you call them?