The Car Ride

When I was sixteen, I caught a ride home from work with a psychopath. I was tired and smelly. (I worked at a steakhouse) and all I wanted to do was get home and take a shower. I didn’t know that the guy was a psychopath. But what else do you call it when someone laughs as they speed up to hit a rabbit that’s hopping across the road. (I can still see the dying rabbit flopping in the middle of the street.)  

There was another person in the car and she thought the whole thing was completely fine. No big deal. (She liked the guy), but I was crying in the backseat and wondering if the world is crazy. Spoiler alert: the world is crazy, and somehow, maddeningly, I’ve found myself stuck in the car again. 

I know what you’re thinking: Buckle up. 

Also, someone who doesn’t like the guy should probably grab for the wheel. 

I’m sorry to break it to you, but I am not that person. I’m not strong enough or fast enough, and the truth is I’m tired of buckling up. I want out of the car. Sometimes I imagine myself sixteen again, but this time, I bum a ride from someone who isn’t a psychopath. 

Or, I walk home. 

It’s not that far. Maybe two miles? And only a small dark stretch through the woods. I make up stories in my head to bide the time. I take deep breaths and keep my eyes on the moon above the trees. 

When I come across the rabbit flopping, I scoop her up in my jacket. I can’t always save her, but I try. 

The Argument

It was a long, hard week with snowy days and the dreary weather, and my husband and I were struggling with the same head cold, me with a sore throat and him with a runny nose, and then it flip-flopped, and I had the runny nose and he had the sore throat, and one morning I slid 

and fell on the sidewalk on my way into work. We'd had an argument earlier and I cried when I fell and cried more in the car as I backed out of the driveway, but then my husband called me and we talked it through and it was painful 

but I knew I would survive the painful feelings, and anyway, it was better than the alternative, what I would've done in the past, which is pretend I didn't care and simmer about how I was right and that was the important thing, which side was right. Maybe the fall jarred some sense into me. There are no sides.

It's only us living our lives together in the dark and silly world, blowing our noses and making each other tea. Later, we forgot what had set us off in the first place, maybe being a human who's sick with a stupid head cold, but whatever it was, no argument between us ever means the end. We got better 

and bundled up and drove in the snow to the grocery store. On the way the traffic stopped in both directions and who knew what was happening ahead. My husband slowed, stopped, and we craned our necks, looking. Suddenly, a dog came trotting down the center of the street, weaving between the cars, and I gasped, bracing myself for a hit, but there was no hit. 

People were pulling over and stepping out of their cars, someone carrying a leash, someone waving a treat, all of them moving cautiously toward the dog, circling, corralling him away from the busy road and onto a side street. When the traffic started moving again, we drove past slowly, watched the dog bend toward the treat, the kind strangers leaning in, 

and I was thinking about random things, like why did I assume the dog would be hit and who were these people driving around carrying spare leashes and dog treats? And wait, why do I keep forgetting that no argument between us has ever meant the end?

The Type of Person

I am the type of person who wears necklaces. Which is interesting, because up to about a week ago, I was not that type of person. I do not wear any jewelry, except earrings, occasionally, and my wedding rings. But during covid, I stopped wearing those. Too germy, I thought. And no more make-up (the masks), and I stopped coloring my hair. And this is probably too much information, but I quit wearing a bra. I mean, who cares. I wasn't going anywhere. 

Every morning, I would wake up at whenever time, and maybe or maybe not change out of my pajama pants and into an old pair of sweats. I rotated between two T-shirts, toss offs from my daughter, that were over-sized and had been washed so many times they were soft and holey and I loved them. 

Just the other day I was cleaning out my closet, brutally purging everything I hadn't worn in a few years and came to those two t-shirts, and a wave of dread and terror and comfort and nostalgia washed over me. I left the T-shirts hanging where they were. But back to being the type of person who wears necklaces--

this was over New Years, and my husband and I were visiting with long-time friends, a tradition we've had for twenty-five years (except 2020 when we set up a Zoom, which was fine, but also, it sucked, and we vowed never to do that again). 

When we first met, the mom and I had little boys who went to the same preschool, and while we'd wait to pick them up, our toddler daughters would parallel play with each other. Flash forward to now, and my friend's daughter is getting married in the fall and had a wedding dress appointment at a fancy shop, and while we were waiting for the appointment, we were browsing the racks, and I was wearing a necklace. 

The necklace was one I'd made several months ago (Was that several months ago?! I do not understand how time works anymore.) My daughter made one too, and then, over Christmas, I noticed she was wearing hers every day, whereas I had only worn mine once. 

I like this necklace, I told my friend, while we were browsing at the fancy shop, but I'm not the type of person who wears necklaces. 

Why can't you be that type of person, said my friend. She was holding an absurd-looking orange purse that was covered in sequins and beads, and she said, Wouldn't it be funny if I bought this purse and used it as my lunch bag for work? I could put my tangerines in it. She looked at the price, and said, HA HA, No!

But I said, Who cares, you should buy it. Every day when you go to work with your tangerines, it will give you joy, and then I told her a story about the time a mutual friend and I were shopping at a make-up counter at a department store a million years ago, and the salesperson showed us a battery-operated mascara wand that you could turn on and it would make a buzzing sound, which struck me as so ridiculous, I couldn't stop laughing. When the salesperson said it cost 85 dollars, I almost peed my pants. My friend said, You have to buy it. Look how happy you are. 

But of course, I said, HA HA No! A few months later the friend sent me the mascara out of the blue. I laughed every time I used it, and now that I think about it, it's probably one of the top five gifts anyone has ever given me. 

Good question, I said to my friend who was still holding the silly orange sequined purse. Why can't I be the type of person who wears a necklace? 

You can, said my friend. Just wear the necklace and wah lah, you're a necklace-wearer. Her daughter was over by the wedding dress section, and my daughter and the daughter of the friend who'd bought me the mascara a trillion years ago had joined her, and I was having a hard time making sense of it, the little girls grown up and here together, and where had the time and mascara gone, and what if everything could be so simple, where you say something and do something and wah lah

it comes true.

My friend put the purse down, and when she wasn't looking, I scooped it up and bought it for her.