Right on...bullseye.  Not a fan of bleeding edge, for that reason.  I prefer leading edge, but can't sacrifice reliable stability for it.  I think Debian is the right fit for me, as my main driver.   I get my bleeding & leading edge "fixes" in my VM choices.  😎

The Chevrolet Trax is similar to my sister's Buick Encore.

In your case, you have to run mission-critical applications in Windows on a VM in Linux. With such high stakes, I can see how stability must be top of mind for you.

Since my husband mainly drives the Jeep and doesn't own a smartphone, no paring will be done. Hopefully he can just listen to the radio the way he does now.   Unfortunately, the Buick dealership is not close to where we live and I'm not subjecting him to driving in grid lock for the yearly inspection.

You just described the IDEAL use of a VM, at least the way I see it.  A way to learn about an OS with no fear of messing up a mission critical system.  And if you do bork something beyond the state of repair, nuke it, reinstall and try again.  In probably 5-10 minutes or less?!  It's a learning lab/test bed!