Shake it Like a Bobcat
My mother and I drove that long and windy road to Vegas this week....
Just us two....
and my in-laws and husband drove separately for the sake of comfort and perhaps for the sake of saving them from "inside" stories that only people in my family would understand and laugh about.
As we drove that long and windy road we shook just a bit. I know I am in need of a wheel alignment, but where is the fun in "funemployment" if I can't enjoy being laid off to procrastinate things that need to be taken care of? Hmm?
And as we started to shake just where the speed needle hits 65, my mother said "what is this? The Bobcat?"
Laughter ensued.
Memories of the Bobcat.
Do you know what a Bobcat is?
The Bobcat was a car. The ugly cousin to the Pinto. And like the Pinto, she was hideous.
There is some discrepancy as to what we paid for that used car. I say $600.00, my mom thinks it was $400.00. But, we definitely got what we paid for.
I suppose we can laugh now. We can laugh now that we are able to afford cars that don't pull apart if you pull a screw the wrong way. We can now afford a vehicle that has air-conditioning, and not one that you have to angle the windows just so in order to keep the air hitting your face on a hot summer's day. And now the radios in our cars work.
And if it couldn't get any worse, the Bobcat was orange. The tackiest and saddest orange hue you could ever envision. And she shook. Ohhhhh, she shook.
My mother hated that car. But it was all we could afford. And as we reminisced about that hideous used Bobcat that held 6 children huddled in its seats, my mother expanded on the memory, even though I have heard it a hundred times before.
As it goes.... She wasn't sad when the car finally gave out on her. She was elated. And it died very suddenly despite the months of warnings. The months of stalling, fingers crossed as she groaned up hills and the sight of children running away from said vehicle for fear their friends would know their parents drove an ugly orange Bobcat. I know, we were bad children that way.
And when it died on the freeway, as my mother was heading home from work, she must have cheered just a little on the inside. And she called my father from a payphone (remember those?) and he came to tow her. No AAA. No tow-truck. Just my dad, his truck, and a long rope. And my father is still just about the only man I know that could ever pull something so resourceful together to get that hideous Bobcat back to our home and soon thereafter, out of our lives.
What's your 'hoopty' story? I hope you have one, too.
Just us two....
and my in-laws and husband drove separately for the sake of comfort and perhaps for the sake of saving them from "inside" stories that only people in my family would understand and laugh about.
As we drove that long and windy road we shook just a bit. I know I am in need of a wheel alignment, but where is the fun in "funemployment" if I can't enjoy being laid off to procrastinate things that need to be taken care of? Hmm?
And as we started to shake just where the speed needle hits 65, my mother said "what is this? The Bobcat?"
Laughter ensued.
Memories of the Bobcat.
Do you know what a Bobcat is?
The Bobcat was a car. The ugly cousin to the Pinto. And like the Pinto, she was hideous.
There is some discrepancy as to what we paid for that used car. I say $600.00, my mom thinks it was $400.00. But, we definitely got what we paid for.
I suppose we can laugh now. We can laugh now that we are able to afford cars that don't pull apart if you pull a screw the wrong way. We can now afford a vehicle that has air-conditioning, and not one that you have to angle the windows just so in order to keep the air hitting your face on a hot summer's day. And now the radios in our cars work.
And if it couldn't get any worse, the Bobcat was orange. The tackiest and saddest orange hue you could ever envision. And she shook. Ohhhhh, she shook.
My mother hated that car. But it was all we could afford. And as we reminisced about that hideous used Bobcat that held 6 children huddled in its seats, my mother expanded on the memory, even though I have heard it a hundred times before.
As it goes.... She wasn't sad when the car finally gave out on her. She was elated. And it died very suddenly despite the months of warnings. The months of stalling, fingers crossed as she groaned up hills and the sight of children running away from said vehicle for fear their friends would know their parents drove an ugly orange Bobcat. I know, we were bad children that way.
And when it died on the freeway, as my mother was heading home from work, she must have cheered just a little on the inside. And she called my father from a payphone (remember those?) and he came to tow her. No AAA. No tow-truck. Just my dad, his truck, and a long rope. And my father is still just about the only man I know that could ever pull something so resourceful together to get that hideous Bobcat back to our home and soon thereafter, out of our lives.
What's your 'hoopty' story? I hope you have one, too.
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