a few amazing things

i mentioned we bought a car. but i failed to mention what that means to me: we are selling my thelma, my everlasting tiny car that has been with me since high school, my 1995 geo prism (known to wes as "whitey" ... i just don't think he could muster up the strength to call the car thelma. maybe that's why it broke down on him so much recently!). i worked my tail off waiting tables at a small pizza shop to pay for that car (okay, my parents only paid for a few of the car payments while i was a poor college student). we went through some crazy times, thelma & i....

• during my senior year of high school i opted out & went to a nearby branch of akron university. it was a 45 minute drive through some curvy ohio farm land. no worries, thelma zipped & chugged along. until one day while going down a steep hill on ---oh what is that road called?!---my water bottle fell from the seat next to me onto the floor. & for whatever reason i had a sudden urge to drink some water. so after getting to a straight path in the road (going only about 20 mph) i reached over to the passenger side floor for the bottle & KABOOMPH! went directly into the ditch. & i mean *the entire car was laying sideways in the ditch. a ditch that was filled with run off water from a very near by pond. i was sitting sorta all cockeyed & was totally unphased (seriously, i was just pissed that i was going to be late for class). then...the car started to fill with water. stinky, ditch water. soon a few cars stopped to help me & i had to roll down the driver side window & some burly older guy lifted me out. then i could see what sort of a pickle i was in...my car was totally laying sideways in the absurdly large ditch...when i very nice lady let me use her enormous car cell phone to call my mom i broke down sobbing. i think she thought i was hurt but nope, just suddenly terrified. thelma did me good, then. & the stupid cop who came to take all the accident info didn't believe there was a water bottle until the car was pulled out by this very intense tow-crane-truck (mud dripping from everywhere). i had to take the car to a car wash, open the hood & spray it down...mud was covering everything under the hood. & every single time the car has work done some mechanic asks: WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED UNDER THE HOOD OF THIS CAR? WHY IS MUD *THERE*?! yep, that's how hardcore thelma is.
• later that year (it was an exciting driving year!) i was coming home from a 10 o'clock shift at the pizza joint. it was snowing & had a layer of ice under the snow. the community where my parents live refuse to do much of anything for road treatments so it's like an ice rink or skiing roads. this time i was not picking up anything, just had this total death grip on the steering wheel, trying to stay on the road when i slowly ran over the sewer circle thing (you know, those circular metal coverings, man holes or whatever?) & WHAM the car did a 360 then another 90, landing me on the side of road, in the 'green area' of cinnamon drive (read: in the woods) in between two trees. again, thelma did me good. the sheriff's deputy came & just drove it right back onto the road (no ticket that time!)
• i was driving back to indiana wesleyan university (a place i never tell anyone to ever drive to--no matter what. it's hell on earth. it's america's asshole, etc etc etc) after winter break. there was a storm coming & i was trying to miss it. i figured if i left early in the day i could miss the snowstorm. oh, so wrong. the usual 3 1/2 hour drive took me seven hours. i drove steadily through white outs & snow drifts up around the headlights. i didn't see another car for 20 or 30 minutes at some points. my thought was that if i stopped, i'd be stuck so i just kept driving...& thelma & i made it. i was too nervous of taking my eyes off the road to switch out the cd, so i just kept listening to the same ani difranco cd over & over again...for 7 hours straight. *sigh*
• once i transferred to a legitimate university (OSU) i lived off-campus with a few ladies (two of whom are in the last picture from my last post). i was coming back from target after just splurging on some new lip gloss to wear on my first date with wes...when WHAMMO! this enormous SUV-truck thing slammed into the front end. it was trying to cut across 3 lanes of traffic to turn left & me being in the short little car didn't see above all the looming suv's around me...poor thelma has always been a mite short... anyway, the dude driving was ticketed & i also got to tell off an off duty cop that night.
• wes bought some grass seed, put it on the passenger side floor & left it there for a day or two at which time it sprung a hole, leaking some grass seed onto the floor. now, you may think my engineer hubby would be clean & organized. *wrong* his car looks like, well...a mess. layer upon layer of stuff. so the grass went under a layer of some stuff, with the grass seed under that layer. finally, he decided to clean out the car (oh wait, i failed to mention that the passenger side floor is nearly rotted through & gets soaked when it's raining out. as does the driver's side seat b/c the window won't completely close). anyway, he pulled the layers back to find a few inches of grass growing proudly.on the floor.of the car. see, i think thelma took out her evil side on him...
• driving down to north carolina for a vacation with the two ladies in that last picture of the last post (christine & holli are their names)--it was the week of september 11, 2001 (great memories, eh?). but anyway, the drive there & back was just relaxing & wonderful. we went from ohio to north carolina & thelma chugged out nearly 40 mpg that week. beautiful.

there are so many stories to tell, but such little time. just know that even at 187K miles & looking as crappy as a car can look after all these encounters--plus more!--more than a dozen people wanted to buy it today. it took 6 hours from the time wes posted it on craigslist to the time a person put money in our hands as we handed over the title. who knew we were driving the hottest car in ohio?!

thelma, you will be missed. & yes, i did shed a tear or two...

 me saying goodbye to my thelma, my friend.

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can you tell that amelia has begun to pick out her own clothes?

 

silly girls