peevish mama

I did it again. I frickin’ frackin’ did it again. I wedged my minivan in a mesa of snow right in my Goddamn driveway. Does this sound vaguely familiar? Hmmm? That would be because I have done this before. TWICE. You might have read about it here. But this time, I am really truly disgusted with myself. This time, I am really truly having serious doubts about my intelligence level. Serious, serious, doubts.

We’ve gotten a bit of snow over the last few days. Nothing crazy. Yesterday the plows went through, leaving a pile of snow about two feet wide and one foot high across the driveway. As I approached, I somehow forgot that my minivan is basically the basset hound of cars, and when it snows it’s like a basset hound on roller skates. It’s amazing how many thoughts can flash through one’s mind in the split second it takes to make a really bad decision. So many thoughts, so little help: I never got stuck in the driveway last winter, surely I won’t get stuck now. Actually, better not try this, I might get stuck. But the snow is super powdery. I’ll bust right through like a car commercial. Or maybe I should park in the street. I might get stuck. But what a pain to carry the groceries an extra thirty feet. I’m going for it.

YEEEEEE!!!!! HAAAAAAAA!!!!!!

. . .

FUUUUUUUUCK MEEEEEEEE!!!!

What made me think I could Dukes of Hazzard it across that snow, I have no idea. But I gunned it. All the better to lodge my van in real good. Like Boss Hogg’s fat knuckles stuck in an olive jar. And so there I was. Stuck. Again. I took Devil Baby inside, set her up with some cartoons and came back out cursing a blue streak with a hockey stick in one hand and a shovel in the other. I peered under the car and it was as I suspected. I had no choice but to loosen and push away the snow trapping my chassis. And there’s that word again. Chassis. I haven’t even thought of the word since the last time my chassis was impaled on an iceberg in front of Blooma Yoga. Incidentally, a hockey stick is the tool of choice for this particular type of excavation. A shovel is useless for getting under the car. Being an experienced chassis dislodger, I pulled out a floor mat so my knees wouldn’t freeze, but I eventually ended up completely prostrate, digging on my stomach, and finally my back. I dug for a good hour, making my way around the car, shedding layers and huffing and puffing as I went. My arms felt like feeble noodles and I was sweating buckets when I collapsed onto my back for a moment’s rest, squinting through my sunglasses at the clear blue sky. It was warm and quiet – I could almost make myself believe I was lying on a beach in Florida, except that, in actuality, I was lying in the street in the sludge next to my minivan in Minnesota. Fuuuuuuck, I wailed, cursing myself for the thousandth time. Fuuuuuuuuck! I heard a polite throat clearing and a little Are you stuck? I leapt up to see an older couple standing on the sidewalk with their dog. I dusted the snow off my shoulders, put on my best neighborly smile and assured them that I would be ok. What the hell were they going to do, anyway? At that moment Big Red (she is not big, but her son calls her Big Red, so who am I to pass up such a great nickname?) ran out of her house. She made the Popeye arms at me and insisted on giving me a push, so I relented and got in the van, careful to put it in reverse. And wouldn’t you know it, Big Red and the old man got me out. Goddamn if they didn’t get me out.