Sometimes life is ironic. At the ripe old age of 35, I have been met with more than my fair share of ridiculous, painfully embarrassing ironic situations. It seems I have a knack for being in a shituation (yes, I spelled it right…… a shitty situation) because….. well, various reasons.
Sometimes I don’t always attend to the right things. Planning and forethought are not my forte. This is probably why I rammed my car into a concrete pole mere hours after my husband warned me to not park in a particular space because he said I would most definitely ram my car into the large concrete pole.
Ya’ll, I am not even making it up. It’s too good. It still makes me laugh now that we are 4 years on the other said the concrete pole fiasco of 2015. In 2015, I assure you, we weren’t laughing.
The story goes that my husband spends some time in a funky little city about six hours from our home every year taking executive education training. We decided to take the whole family in 2015 since his class coincided with our spring break. I happened to be majorly pregnant during this trip which adds much-needed detail. I was larger than life in the 3rd trimester of my 3rd pregnancy.
We drove our two actual kids into the city in this really pretty, shiny, and mostly new car that we had just paid off on our journey to become debt-free. Thank you, Dave Ramsey, for setting the stage with this other detail. We were proud as punch to own our own car and my hubby was super protective of it.
So one night, we returned back to the parking garage after dinner and I was driving. WHY? I am very likely to NOT drive. At this point in my pregnancy with my baby whopper, who turned out to be a ten-pounder, I could be found reclined in the passenger side so I wouldn’t pee my pants. My usual parking spot near the elevator was taken. Rats. Another spot was open on the same level, just a little farther of a walk. I spotted it and started to yank the wheel. Cautious Carl growled at me. “No. Why don’t you look on the next level?” he instructed. My cankle applied pressure to the break. Our car sat half in/half out of the spot.”What is wrong with this spot, dear, ” I asked sweetly.
“You are right next to a pole! You won’t be paying attention and I don’t want you to hit it. “
I gave him the hardest eye roll. “Oh my gosh. No, I won’t. I am not going to look for another spot. This place is packed and I need to be near the elevator. Did you forget how pregnant I am? Tomorrow I will be packing kids and all of our luggage out here while you are in class. We are parking here. ” I was driving. I made the rules. In the spot, I went.
The next day we swam, hung out, and packed up to go home. I loaded everything in the car, strapped the kids in the car, walk around the POLE, heft myself in the car, think about how I am going to keep my kids occupied for the next two hours before he is done with class, put the car in reverse, and rammed my pretty car into the concrete pole.
There is nothing quite like the shame of doing something you know is stupid. Now, add a bunch more shame because your dang near-perfect husband PREDICTED that you were likely going to do the said stupid thing less than 18 hours ago.
And then I hard to drive around the city with my mirror hanging by wires. I went into various businesses asking for duct tape to tape it back on for the trip home. All the while, dreading what was going to happen when Shawn saw the door. I went back to the University at the time to his class was over. The passenger side was only visible to him as he left the building. As he approached the driver’s side, I could see his face. He wasn’t even the least bit smug, as I am sure I would have been. He didn’t say, “I told you so.” His face said it all.
Then we drove the 6 hours home. In silence.
