There is such a thing as a "head gasket," and it should cost a whole lot of money to replace. This information came from my father, whom I called after the service manager at my dealership, Jimmy, told me my head gasket needed replacing—to the tune of more than a month's salary. Since I'd seen a lot of Jimmy for a while, I generally trusted him, even though he'd given up trying to explain my car problem du jour to me right around the time he heard me use the word "thingy." (I don't think it's considered proper automotive terminology.)

But a head gasket sounded like a small thingy to me, even if it was the head one. Apparently (again, according to my dad), in order to replace a head gasket, the mechanic basically has to disassemble your entire engine like a big metal Lego set. Mine might have been more time-consuming than most, due to the thin layer of coolant covering each part of my engine. Take it from me, coolant is sticky stuff.

You do not want to be without your alternator. When my first alternator died (this has become an annual event, which I anticipate with the same eagerness as my dental appointments), I was on my way to my tiny college town for a friend's graduation. Everything electronic in my car went haywire, and then my engine died, leaving me stranded in the middle of nowhere. This was in the days when only drug dealers carried cell phones, and since I wasn't a drug dealer, I stood on the shoulder dressed in my cute new skirt ensemble waiting for someone to stop. Someone did stop: a dairy farmer on an honest-to-goodness John Deere tractor. He helped me climb up, skirt ensemble and all, and gave me a ride to his milking house, where I was able to call a friend to come and get me.

Car problems make me nostalgic for the high-school days of driving my mom's 1986 Celebrity. Since my dad was there to deal with big issues, I only had to wrestle with the car's little idiosyncrasies, like the radio going out whenever I hit a big bump. To get it working again, I had two options. First, I could hit another bump of equal or

greater size, but I was told this was bad for my alignment. (Note: Men don't accept "alignment schmalignment" as valid automotive theory.) Second, I could smack the dash very hard with a closed fist, a solution discovered by my football player friend, whose actual name was Goober.

Eventually the Celebrity gave up the ghost, and I moved to New York City, where I had no car. For a while, I was free of all this frustration and expense, though conversations with my dad got noticeably shorter. His usual opening line of "How's your car?" became moot, leaving him at a loss for words.

But now I live in Texas, where motor vehicles aren't simply necessary, they're legally mandated. And with this new state comes a different set of procedures for inspecting, registering, and insuring my car, along with the search for an oil-change guy I can at least half trust.

All this reminds me of how irritatingly independent my perpetual singleness requires me to be. I find myself wishing for a man in my life just so he can deal with my auto-repair needs. He would never be robbed by the oil-change guy.

The good news is, I've become surprisingly adept at adding coolant to my aging car, which leaks it like a discount diaper. I carry antifreeze in my trunk along with a bottle of water and a more portable MacGyver-worthy device consisting of three plastic cups, one of which has a hole punched in the bottom to serve as a funnel. I spill a lot less now.

Let the men of the world shake their heads and mutter "women." We single girls have to fend for ourselves—even when armed only with a diet soda bottle, an owner's manual, and a little ingenuity.

Lori Graham, an educational specialist who lives in Texas, is at work on her first novel.