Grouchy gramps derails airport run

Dear Amy: Recently my daughter-in-law asked my wife to drive her and her two little kids to the airport (100 miles away) using our car.

Mind you, the daughter-inlaw has a brand-new $50,000 SUV, but wanted my wife to drive OUR car to the airport.

This would leave me without a car to drive in case I needed it.

The daughter-in-law didn’t offer to let me use her car while my wife was doing this favor for her.

So I took off in our car the morning of the trip to go shopping and do some errands.

I told my wife to drive the daughter-in-law’s car, as it is newer, safer, and with all the newest gadgets for safety for the kids, etc.

Now the daughter-in-law and my wife are mad at me because she had to use her car to get to the airport.

I feel she is selfish and taking advantage of my wife and our car!

She says she didn’t want to drive her new SUV in city traffic.

Should I have to pay for wear and tear on my car so the daughter-in-law can keep her new expensive SUV without using it?

Nobody is listening to me, so I am looking for a third party to weigh in.

Rightful Owner

Dear Owner: Well, you might want to keep looking for another opinion, because, in my opinion, what you did was really obnoxious.

Your passive-aggressive behavior really threw a spanner into the proceedings.

Your daughter-in-law and your wife had made an arrangement that you didn’t like, and so, rather than talk to them both about it and staking your (rightful) claim to your own family’s car, you simply took it, leaving them to scramble on the morning of the trip.

It seems disingenuous for you to pretend not to understand why they are mad at you now.

I am assuming that your daughter-in-law might have been nervous about your wife driving her new, powerful, unfamiliar vehicle alone on the way back from the airport. It’s not just that designer SUVs are expensive, but a BMW and a Buick are distinctly different vehicles to operate.

Regardless, I do agree with you in a basic sense about the use of the cars.

I completely agree with them, however, about your behavior. Badly done.