Today we said “Goodbye” to a friend… our van.

Today we left our friend at a car lot as we drove off in another van.

Today we said goodbye to a van that has:

• carried two of our four girls home from the hospital
• survived a deer and the rear-end of another car
• made me get several speeding tickets
• carried us to: Atlanta, Chicago, Pittsburgh, New York City, Orlando, Hershey, Charlotte, Cincinnati, Emerald Island, Buffalo, Rochester, Spartanburg, and a ton of other cities!
• held us as we sang, cried, laughed, puked, told stories, yelled, prayed, meditated, and expressed ourselves in a multitude of other ways
• made me an expert at changing lock and tumblers
• broke us into the mini-van scene
• side-swiped our real-estate agent’s car after she told us our house was priced to high

Today we say goodbye to our minivan. Tonight we bid farewell to a van, a friend, a holder of many memories.

And now a pictorial tribute and a moment of silence…