Miss My Firefly

I dearly miss my Firefly. That was the name I gave my Nissan Juke immediately after I bought it. I felt it was very fitting, for both the funky design and spunky character of the car. Oh, I miss it so much!

I thought that living in the Republic of Georgia for nine months would help me get over it but I miss it even more intensely here.

Jukes are everywhere here in Tbilisi. I see them so often I've lost count. There's one "living" in the parking garage of my apartment building. It's living there because I've never seen it driven and it always stands in the same spot and position. Every time I see it my heart aches even more because it's exactly the same color as my Juke was - silver metal.

Firefly was my second used car. I bought it in 2016 with 68K miles on it. It was impeccably maintained by its two previous owners and I had no problems with it until summer 2023 when it suddenly started to fall apart.

It was an AWD, which gave me confidence to drive in the snow in Cleveland, Pittsburgh and Toronto. I once got into a heavy blizzard on my 1.5-hour drive home from Cleveland. I didn't even feel scared of losing control or skidding off the road. It brought me home just fine.

I loved it for the size - it's a compact SUV - and extreme maneuverability. It handled any road so well, never failed me. I also loved it for not huffing and puffing going up the mountains on those beautiful serpentine Appalachian roads. I'd simply put it into and AWD mode and enjoy the scenery.

It handled any weather - heat, blizzards, winds, and downpours - exceptionally well. Yes, I drive around so much that I get myself into all sorts of weather conditions.

I remember when we were driving back to Pennsylvania from a winter break in Texas, we got into a heavy rain crossing into Arkansas. It lasted so long, it seemed like the rain was moving with us and would never end. I just turned on AWD mode and the hazard lights on, put the windshield wipers on max and moved slower at a good distance from the car in front of me. My son, who already had his driver's license for about a year, was concerned that I was driving for too long and offered to switch but I kept promising that we'd do it when the rain comes down or when we need to fill up. To be honest, I was worried he didn't have enough experience to drive in the weather like that. But then we did run out of gas and switched at the gas station because I'd promised. I was a little nervous at first but finally decided to trust both the car and my son. The rain eventually calmed down before we stopped in Little Rock for the night. And my son got good experience of driving in the rain.

I never had accidents in that car and only got a couple of speeding tickets. One was when Firefly still was new to me and I drove 73 on a 50 mph road. The road was good and the Firefly was riding so smoothly I didn't even notice how fast I was going until the cop turned on the siren behind me. The second ticket was in Virginia and I was only going 7 mph over the speed limit but the cop was attracted to my out of state plate. I don't count the third ticket because my son was driving the Firefly in New York near Dunkirk, coming back from Toronto. He felt bad enough for me to add to his guilt, and his reasoning was the same as mine - the car was too smooth.

The most dramatic experience I had in my Firefly was when I was driving from the north to Atlanta through West Virginia, on one of those two-lane parts of I-79 that have exits only every 30 miles or so. I was driving in the fast lane, 75 on 70 mph, keeping my distance from an 18-wheeler truck in the right slow lane in front of me. Suddenly, another SUV bigger than mine decided to overtake the truck. There was not enough space for him to do that in front of me so he ended up brushing me on my passenger side. I think what saved me was that we were going at about the same speed, and that I was in the AWD mode. Otherwise I would have found myself in the ditch. My Firefly received a long scrape and a dent on the passenger side but other than that it took the brush of death and stupidity well. The other guy just quickly retreated and got off the next exit without even slowing down. I had to get off to fill up and take a long breath. I still get goosebumps when I remember that incident.

My Firefly served me well, but it was getting old after seven years of intensive use and 167K miles I put on it. First, the air conditioner went out. That last drive from Atlanta up to Washington DC in a 104F August heat was not fun. Then it started to make noises and grumbles that scared me. When it failed the state inspection in December 2023 and the estimated cost of repairs was over $3K, I decided it was time to get a new car. Nissan dealership credited me with $1,500 in the trade-in and promised that they'd fix my Firefly and make it into a good starter car for some high school kid. I hope it's still out there somewhere.

They stopped making Jukes for the US market in 2017. So for my new car, I had to buy a FWD Nissan Kicks. It's nowhere near my Firefly in terms of performance, look and driving experience. Even though it's essentially the same engine, different body, as I was assured. And they don't make Kicks in the AWD version, which made my life in Pennsylvania snow more miserable. I miss my Firefly so much!