The Subaru Saga

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About 5 years ago Bill bought me a 1998 Subaru station wagon. It was perfect! It was one of those cars that you sat in and it was an instant bond, that it was a perfect fit for both you and the car. I loved that car! It was white, which isn't my favorite color for a car, but I could overlook that. It was a 5 speed stick shift which was super, and it had the heart of a stallion. It hauled a lot of cargo for me, and was my best friend in the car world. October 2, 2017 our relationship was ended, my house caught fire and unfortunately my beloved Subaru was caught in the blaze. The car, license plates and vehicle identification number were destroyed in the blaze. Keep this in mind because it is important in the saga. March 2018 I had a contractor clear the remains of my home and Subaru from my lot. The remains of the house went either to the dump or to recycling. Finally it came to the Subaru. Robin, my contractor, carefully cut the car into four pieces so he could load it onto the trailer and take it to town to his place and crush it for recycling. BUT to recycle it I had to get a form from our local motor vehicle office. Ahh that's where the saga really begins! We went in to try to get a duplicate title as the original was burned in the fire. The motor vehicle office was jam packed! So since both Bill and I can't stand for very long we left. Our neighbor has a business where she takes care of things like that so she offered to deal with it. We got our paper back with a note on it that the car had been listed as destroyed and could be scrapped. GREAT! Robin tried to take the Subaru in for recycling. They wouldn't take it without form 488 stating that the vehicle was destroyed and couldn't be salvaged. UHHHHH, just looking at it you could tell that! There were no seats to speak of, no windows, no tires, no paint, the engine was melted...there was no bumpers....there was no way it could be salvaged. But they insisted on the form. Back to Motor Vehicles! In the mean time Robin informed us that he was getting tired of having the four piece Subaru statue in his front yard, could we do something about getting the paperwork for getting it into recycling? We chanced going in again. Bill managed to get some forms to request a duplicate title, which I filled out so he could possibly get things rolling on getting the form. I even made an appointment at our Motor Vehicle office to save Bill having to stand for a long period of time. After a 45 minute wait he was called to the window for service. Bill explained the problem and presented the paperwork. The representative reviewed the paperwork and stated "We can't do a thing for you!" Bill, who is slow to boil, demanded to know what that meant. He was informed that without the license plates they couldn't do anything. Bill explained that the fire was so hot that the plates burned...no luck. That was yesterday. Today I am going to call the California head office of motor vehicles in Sacramento to see what the heck we can do. It's bad enough trying to emotionally deal with losing my home, possessions, companion animals and car in the fire but to have this kind of problem dealing with the remains of my car....and I try to be a good citizen and recycle as much as possible, I hate to see what's left of my car go to the dump. And come to think of it they probably wouldn't take it anyhow. So off to continue the saga. Thanks for letting me vent.