* A Car Is Only As Good As Its Lights

I am Presbyterian, so I DO NOT believe in bad luck. HOWEVER, if I didn't know any better, I'd swear I was a bad luck magnet. Here is a disclaimer before this story even begins...I DO NOT GIVE A FLYING FIG ABOUT CARS! Do I make myself perfectly clear? A car is a tool...a big expensive tool. I don't care about the make, the model, the color or anything about how fast it goes, or how much gas it guzzles. I only care that it will reliably carry me from point A to point B in reasonably air conditioned comfort.

Once when I was teaching at Hillcrest Christian School, the loud speaker came on in my room and the secretary said, "Mrs. McInnis, your husband just brought your new car and took your old one. He left the keys in the office for you. He said he hoped you liked it." I heard a snicker from the back of the room. "What's that snicker for?" I inquired. One of the boys said, "What does that mean, he hoped you liked it? What kind of car is it?" I looked him dead in the eye and said, "I have absolutely no idea." The boys went wild! How could you not know?! They were incredulous! I said, "Let's go see what it is." They all jumped up and shot out of the room like they were going to a steak dinner. When we got outside, I tried to remember where I parked my car...the keys I picked up from the office said Buick..so we looked for a Buick. There it was, candy apple red..they were all looking at it and making comments..I said, "Ok, we've seen it, let's go back inside." What you are not going to drive it? They were sickened by my laissez faire attitude. I think I lost a lot of points that day with all the young men in my class.

Here's the point, I just don't care about certain things and cars are one of those things. Am I weird? Probably, but so what? Now if you ask me if it's important that the "Mississippi River" trademark on my McCarty pottery is prominent on a vase or plate, then that's something I can get fired up about...but a car? Oh, please. So tonight when I had another NDE (near death experience) I decided maybe knowing a little something about the car was important.

I've had my Grand Prix for about 2 1/2 years. It came with those headlights that automatically stay on all the time..even in the daytime. Pretty wasteful if you ask me, but since Pontiac didn't ask me, it is what it is. (No wonder they are going out of business.) I have never in 2 1/2 years even thought about the headlights because I just knew they were on no matter how dark or light it was. Until tonight. I don't drive very well anytime but I really don't drive well at night. When I went into Wal Mart it was light. But you know how you get sucked into the vortex of WallyWorld and next thing you know, the morning paper is being delivered as you drive in the driveway. So after several hours, I loaded the groceries and began the trek home. I took a short cut through a very winding back road and I knew it was awfully hard to see and I noticed several times I veered off the road or over the line but I chalked it up to the fact that there are no lights on the road and all the houses are set back off the road. UNTIL...all at once I couldn't see anything!

There were cars coming toward me and behind me and I couldn't see. At first I thought my cataract implants had both gone bad at the same moment and then with utter dismay, I noticed that all my lights were out both inside and out! In a panic, I felt for the place where they used to put that switch that turned on the lights...no switch. I grabbed the right handle thing...the wipers came on. I grabbed the left handle thing..the blinker began blinking...well at least the people behind me could see there was an idiot ahead of them with no lights on except the right blinker. I couldn't pull off the road..I couldn't see the road! I pushed, I pulled, I slammed on brakes, I did everything and then I saw a message on my dashboard message reader thing. It said, "Headlamps suggested."

I have young blog followers who read my posts, so I won't say what went through my mind at that moment. Suffice to say, I almost tore the left handle thing out of its socket, but I finally managed to get the high beam lights to turn on. (To add to the drama, I haven't had a hormone pill in two days and I was beginning to sweat like it was the 4th of July.) By the time I finally got the light situation under control, I felt like a limp dishrag. HOWEVER, I DID get it under control and proceeded toward home sweet home. This ends my night excursions. I know when I'm licked and this did it. No more driving after 6 P.M. Tomorrow I am going to have husband show me where in the sam hill the light switch is actually located on the left handle thing. (As John read this, he reminded me that we have had the car 4 years not 2 1/2 years...see? I told you, cars just aren't really a big item to me.)