I recently paid off my little car so she’s all mine now.

She’s a 2013 Smart Passion For Two, gray in color and a little squirrel on the road. She winds in and out of traffic with ease and can slip into the tiniest spots. I named her Fourtwome as 42 is the answer to life, the universe and everything and it’s in the name – “for two” so it seemed to fit. I think she likes the name, she’s never complained. She’s an automatic, but you can also use her as a manual, with paddle controls…had to do it once, see below. She’s surprisingly roomy, enough for me to fit in comfortably and any passengers I’ve had have said they thought they’d be cramped, but they’re not.

I, with the aid of my friend Jim, drove her out to Virginia Beach from Phoenix about 4 years ago now. She handled the road fine, didn’t give us any problems. She was packed with my stuff, what I didn’t ship I stuffed into her back cargo area, I had a lot back there and we still had room for Jim and I to have suitcases.

My first year in Virginia Beach she had a few issues, nothing serious, just hard on the pocketbook. My second year out here she got stuck like she wanted to get out of gear, but she wouldn’t I had to use the paddle shifters to get her to go. The folks at Christian Brothers Automotive fixed her up for a few hundred dollars and she hasn’t given me a hard time since.

People wave to me at stop lights, car washes or what have you and ask me questions about her:

“How fast can she go?”
I’ve had her up to 85 but then she starts to shake, so no faster

“How many miles per gallon do you get?”
I think it’s about 38 – 41

“Hey, how much is it to fill that thing up?”
depending on gas prices, it’s about $23. She only holds 8 gallons

She gets me to work and back and that’s mostly what I use her for. I have taken her for long trips, 3 – 4 hours away and she does fine. She handles fine next to big semi trucks. I do have problems when people can’t seem to see her though, almost been run off the road a few times and they complain at work about my small car not letting them see the spots been taken.

I’ve done some maintenance on her myself, changed out the headlights and the taillights a couple of times. Some of it is hard to get to, being so small it’s kind of cramped in there, but I hear normal sized cars are the same. There are YouTube shows on everything it seems and that’s how I figured out how to do it.

She’s only got about 82,000 miles on her and I hope she lives to be past 100,000. She’s a good little car and I’m glad she’s mine.