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Adult moments. Almost.
The move. NOTE: Names and places changed to protect the innocents. Note: This is a decision and a move that happened in less than a month.
Kid, not yet fully adult: “So, we’re just planning on hooking a flatbed trailer thing behind our car when we move to Arizona.”
Mom, fully adult: “You’re planning on moving your bed on a flat bed trailer? Over Raton Pass. At the beginning of winter?”
A couple of days, maybe hours, later:
Kid: “So, we’re going to rent a trailer and pack everything into it and hook it to our car.”
Mom: “Do you have a trailer hitch?”
Kid: “A what?”
Mom: “How much weight can your car pull?”
Kid: “A bed doesn’t weight that much.”
Mom: “How many boxes are you packing?”
Kid: “50?”
Mom: “You’re married now. There are two of you.”
Week later:
Kid: “We’re getting a moving van and I just found out I have to be at my job a week earlier, so I have to move this week. Can you help? Now?”
A few hours later, after mom is helping stuff things into her kid’s car.
Mom, sniffing the inside of the car: “Do you want to take the ozone machine with you?”
Kid: “Oh that’s just the bucket of deer parts.”
Mom: Silent.
Mom, a few hours later, talking to her husband: “Deer parts?”
Dad, another fully adult: “I gave her a lid for the bucket.”
Now, as a trained journalist, I know that the Who, What, When, Where and How are the important elements when writing a lead to a news story. Who or what is always more important than when, usually. For example, you don’t start a story by writing, “On October 30, at 4 p.m. there was an explosion …..” Instead, you start the sentence by saying “An explosion rocked the corner of…” Or “Freddy Kruger killed another teenager….” The what and the who are generally more interesting than the where and the when. Freddy, by the way, is the scary monster in the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise. He’s a fully formed monster.
Anyway, upon listening to this story unfold, my question was not What? Or how or even where. But Why? And that story is yet to be told.
Anyway, I remember my first cross country move, on my own, when I was in my mid 20s. I was moving from West Virginia to Wyoming to go to law school. Most of my stuff had been shipped, courtesy of my dad, to be stored at his warehouse, because the tiny air stream trailer where I would be living for 3 years, only had enough space for me. And the two dogs. And the 2 cats. Maybe 3 cats. Which all came with me in my relatively tiny Dodge Dart. Plus my stereo, television, clothes, books, kitchen stuff, bathroom stuff, bedding stuff. The back end of the car had also been hit, causing the trunk locking device to fall out. I could keep the trunk closed without a rope, but I had to open it with a screw driver.
I was not a fully formed adult, yet. But I knew what I was doing. Yup. You betcha.
That was about the time I discovered that you can’t get the smell of cat pee out of a carpet, even if you try mixing bleach and ammonia together. Clearly the warning labels on things are written for not fully formed adults. But you do have to read them. Did I mention I was teaching at a college at the time?
Anyway, this was also about the time when I ran next door (I was living in a condo) to get something important from my neighbor while my oil was heating up in the frying pan. I was planning on crisping my tortillas. I subsequently learned that you can’t wash black oil smoke off walls. You have to paint. And while throwing salt on a pan fire may put it out, the salt can’t be in clumps. This was West Virginia and humidity isn’t kind to things like salt. I tried hitting the blue Morton Salt container against the counter to unclump the salt, and the bottom fell out dropping clumps of salt on the floor. Throwing clumps of salt at a fire doesn’t work.
Those were the days. I had to drive 30 minutes to get to a town to do my laundry. Sometimes, I had brake fluid in the brake lines. Sometimes I didn’t. This was West Virginia where the concept of a straight road doesn’t exist. I also could only afford to buy retreds. Scary, right? And I never got the car licensed in West Virginia, mostly because I didn’t know that was a thing until my last year when a cop finally gave me a warning ticket to get licensed or else. Fortunately, I was moving soon, to another state where the car wouldn’t be licensed.
How long does it take to become a fully formed adult? If you can survive your 20s, maybe when you’re 50? I don’t know. I suspect I’m still learning.
But I do know that now, as a fully formed adult, I can decide to eat popcorn for dinner. I can use the floor on the passenger side of my car as a trash bin until my next fill up. I can stay up past my bedtime. I don’t have to make my bed. I can put Mick Jagger’s lips for a border on a quilt. I can buy more yarn from Norway to fix a knitting mistake.
And I can watch scary movies in October. Fortunately, I only have 2 days to go. They do get a little old.
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