Reality Check

I spent all day yesterday getting new tags for both of our vehicles. I took my car for inspection, and of course it flunked! I should have known it wound, since the poor thing has been mute since I put it in an icey ditch last winter while negotiating these hilly, windy Ozark roads in an unfamilar area during the course of my work day (home health nurse covering seven rural counties). I had crested a steep hill only to be confronted with the unpleasant fact that the road FORKED sharply to the left and sharply to the right. You could not see until you CRESTED the hill that the fork was there, yet the moment you crested you had to INSTANTLY steer sharply right or left. Well, I wasn't sure WHICH way was the continuation of the highway I was on and which was a different road and there was no clue VISUALLY. In the split second that it took me to decide, it was too late to MAKE the sharp turn left (or right!). I mostly went left, but my passenger wheel didn't quite keep on the road, it slipped off the pavement (a bit of a drop...we don't believe in having ANY shoulder at all to our roads down here in the Ozarks!) and that, of course, as my wheel came back up onto the pavement, caused me to slingshot all the way LEFT across to the far side of the road, spin (the roads were snowy), fly back across to the side I had started at and land in the very steep ditch facing the wrong way. Not a good day at work!!! Well, to my amazement, I was able to rock the car (forward, reverse, forward, reverse) and actually get out of the ditch on my own without having to call a tow truck, which, considering I had no cell signal there and there were was no passing traffic and no houses in sight, might have been a bit challenging! The poor car had turf packed all through the front end and somehow, the bottom of the back door on the drivers side had gotten curmpled (but still opens and closes...just looks bad) and I had bent a rim and my horn was mute, but, other than that, you would never know I had taken on that portion of O Highway and lost!

Which brings me back to yesterday! I KNEW my horn was not working. I have remembered it each time someone crests one of our many hills coming straight at me in MY lane with their head turned down as they answer a text message (or fiddle with their cell phone) while driving at break neck speeds on our narrow, shoulderless highways, which, did I mention are nothing but continual twists and turns and blind hills?! Yup! I'll hit my horn to get them to look up...and NOTHING! Pretty scary since 9 times out of 10 there is no route of escape. Did I mention we have NO SHOULDERS on these rural highways? Our highways have pretty rock outcroppings and steep drop-offs and TREES, lots of densely growing trees instead of shoulders. And, since it is forever between pockets of civilization, we tend to have only TWO types of drivers....the old fellow who is driving his tractor, or driving his car that evidently doesn't go any faster than a tractor(!), who tops out at say 15 mph (and I have gotten stuck behind MANY such vehicles...and since I don't pass in a no passing zone and since our no passing zones may continue unbroken for 30 some odd miles, I have CRAWLED back to the office before, stuck behind someone in a pedal car!) or there is the other type who drives 70 mph or better, curves and all. I have always tried to keep it down to 55...and, after last winter's wake up call, that has been a lot easier for me. But, I digress. As much as the 15 mph people frustrate me, I have yet to see one of THEM coming at me in my lane as they take a curve cresting a hill...I regularly see the speeding multi-taskers do this. You think I exagerate saying "regularly"...let me put a number to it...this has happened FOUR times since I lost my horn last winter. Four times of seeing your life flash before your eyes in the course of eight months feels pretty "regularly" to me!

In my defense, I DID ask them to fix my horn when I had the car in the shop a few weeks ago getting my airconditioning compressor replaced for the THIRD time in 13 months (this car EATS a/c compressors). They promised they would fix the horn. They called me three different times that day to update me on the price and progress of my repairs and each time I asked, "Have you found out what the problem is with my horn?" and each time I was told, "We haven't had time to get to that yet, but we will." The last time they called to say that the car was finished and I could come pick it up (just a half hour before closing) and I asked, "And what was the problem with the horn?" I was told, "Sorry. We didn't have time to do anything with that. He looked at it and it is smashed up...that is probably why it isn't working...but, you will have to make another appointment and bring it in later to get it fixed."

So, it was, that yesterday I had my beat up little red car in line at Super Lube to get my inspection. It is not a good sign when you see a little yellow slip coming back into the office instead of a white one. Guess what? My horn doesn't work! Who knew THAT was part of the inspection? But, I am glad it is...because, you REALLY need your horn down here!!! So, I bowed my head in humiliation and slunk out to my failing car and puttered over to the nearest repair shop (NOT the one that had dropped the ball on my horn a couple of weeks ago) and looked pitiful enough that that already short-handed crew agreed to see to my horn while I waited. They offered to put in a "universal horn", readily on hand (I'm thinking, "that sounds fast") and CHEAP (that always sounds good!), so I quickly agree. In retrospect, maybe I should have asked to HEAR what a 'universal horn' sounds like, before agreeing so quickly! An hour later, I was zipping back over to the inspection place with my newly acquired universal horn. Back out on the street, I couldn't help but bump the horn once to hear my long mute car give voice once more. "CHEEP" just about describes the sound of my pathetic little horn. It sounds like the horn Darcy had on her bicycle when she was still in training wheels...the kind that you squeeze the bulb and it lets out a high-pitched little yelp out and back in again! I might be too embarassed to USE this horn...people will LAUGH at me, if they can even HEAR the pitiful little thing! My birthday is coming up, and I have decided, what I want is an AIR HORN!!! I want to sound BIGGER than I am!!!

So, back to the inspector...got my nice white slip. Drove to the college and swapped my vehicle for Grant's and went back to join the inspection line once more. His, of course!, got a white slip the FIRST time around...he doesn't put HIS vehicle into ditches, like I do! Then, back to the college to get back into MY beat up little car which Ransom I prefer to ride in. (Did I mention that Ransom was with me all day? She was quite a hit walking into Grant's graphic arts class to get his keys! Afraid my husband would frown on me bringing her into the school like that, I quickly explained that she was a "seeing eye dog in training". After all THAT is the line a police friend of ours uses each time he takes his shepherd into Wal-Mart and no one bats an eye! And, no, his dog is not going to be a seeing eye dog! I wouldn't ever say she is a seeing eye dog in training to anyone but my husband...thought I might need to clarify here!...these blogs can really get you into trouble!!!)

Then we were off to the Liscensing Bureau. Ransom waited in the car with the windows rolled down, while I zipped in and took care of business. (Didn't figure I could waltz her in to the Liscense Bureau like I did the into the Super Lube, the repair shop, and the college.) Come to find out, Missouri is issuing all new liscense plates. I like the old design better, but, I guess the new design is easier for highway patrolment to read on the fly. As she was passing me the four new plates, it dawned on me that here I was in the LISCENSING BUREAU and my driver's liscense was due to expire in three short weeks! Come to find out, though, you have to present a birth certificate to get your liscense renewed. I have NO IDEA where on earth my birth certificate is. It is lost somewhere in that black hole that devoured countless things when we moved last year from KC down to here. I asked if they would take a passport instead and they said they would. So, back to the college Ransom and I went to get my passport (out of Grant's briefcase). Passport in hand, I went back the Liscense Bureau quite pleased that I was actually taking care of this EARLY instead of just remembering at the very last second, like I usually do.

I passed the eye test and road sign recognition test...but, what I didn't pass was the clerks inspection of my old liscense! REALITY CHECK: She looked at my liscense and looked at me...then, diplomatically said, "It says here that you are 4 foot 11 and weigh...125 pounds?" (looking at me over the tops of her glasses). Me, squirming, "Um, well, they have never made me change that before," guiltily remembering back to when I had dutifully changed my weight (without prompting) from 95 pound up to the horrendously heavy weight of 125 pounds, thinking, 'I'll get back down to 95 before my next liscense comes due.' Instead, I had gotten even HEAVIER before the next liscense came due...but, I hadn't admitted to it. And then I had gotten even HEAVIER with each succeeding renewal, but, no one had ever called me on it. When they asked, "Do we need to change anything on your liscense?" I had always replied, "No!" But THIS woman, looked right at me and ASKED, "Do you WEIGH 125 pounds?" I wanted to say, "Yes. Yes I do!" (because I DO weight 125 pounds... with a remainder of 57 pounds). But, instead I said, "Well, actually, I weigh about 180 pounds." Really, that very morning I weighed 182.6 pounds...but, I figure it like this, THEY knock my HEIGHT down from four feet eleven AND A HALF inches to a mere four feet eleven inches on my driver's liscense, so I just knocked off the two and a half pounds that would go with that half an inch!!!

So, now, not only do I have a driver's liscense with a dreadfully horrible photo, but it also proclaims an EMBARRASSING WEIGHT! I made that woman PROMISE that if I lose a substantial amount of weight they will make me up an ENTIRELY NEW liscense with the corrected information and a new photo. She said they certainly would. So, one more piece of motivation dangling under my nose to get me to shed all this extra padding I have acqired over the last 26 years!

Oh, something cool...I guess Missouri just passed legislation three weeks ago so that now, if you want to be an organ donor, they put a special little emblem right there on the front of your liscense. Then, first responders know immediately that you wish to be an organ donor. The lady at the Liscense Bureau told me that if you have that little emblem on the front of your liscense, not even your surviving family members can stand in the way of you donating. Cuts through a lot of red tape and bureaucracy!






I'm sporting my nifty little emblem on my liscense...are you?!