Happy Birthday Nana
McClendon Studios Presents:
Driving Mrs. Crazy
When my sister went off to college and I was still in high school, it was normal that my mother and I would drive down and move my sister into her dorm at the beginning of a semester. When the semester was over, we would move her out.
A side note here is that no one in my family has ever helped me move anywhere. When I moved in to my trailer in Spartanburg, South Carolina, my friend Phil Brown helped me move in.
My dog, Abby, and I moved all by ourselves from the trailer to the house on Burnett Street in Spartanburg. My girlfriend and now child-bride Suzanne, along with our friends Roger and Debbie, helped me move out of the Spartanburg house.
At the beginning of one semester, I drove the truck from Iva to Columbia to move my sister into her dorm at the University of South Carolina. All along the way, my mother had comments about my driving. “You are following too close.” Or, “You are braking too hard.” Finally, I stopped the truck in the middle of the road and asked my mother, “Do you want to drive?” She responded, “No, you are doing just fine.”
We spent a couple of hours unloading the truck and carrying the crates, refrigerator, television, etc., up the elevator at my sister’s dorm. Of course, all of this entailed enduring snippy comments from her suitemates and other residents of her floor. I don’t make a great presentation when I am hot, sweaty, and forced to endure stupid and rude.
My mother and I climbed back in the truck and proceeded to go to my Grandmother Ruby’s house in Johnston, South Carolina. We were going to move some of her stuff back to our place in Iva because my Grandmother Ruby was moving there.
My mother has a way of making work much harder than it has to be. Rather than letting a person proceed in a way that makes sense, she attacks it all at one time.
She started taking things apart and hauling them to the front porch. I had to work around all this clutter to load the truck with the larger, heavier stuff on the bottom.
I finally got the truck loaded with the stuff and everything tied down. I gave my Grandma Ruby a goodbye hug and off my mother and I went for the longest 76 mile drive ever taken.
The posted speed limit along most of the route was 55 miles per hour. Every time I would get the truck above 35 miles per hour, my mother would get on to me about driving so fast.
Every time I would try to move the truck away from the center line of the road, my mother would tell me I was getting way too close to the edge of the road and that I was going to run off in the ditch.
Due to the slow speed, cars were piling up behind us. Sometimes one would pass, but not often. About halfway home, our ever-increasing line of cars was joined by the most welcomed man of the hour, Super Trooper.
Super Trooper lit me up. That is the rolling blue lights came on and I was pulled over.
Super Trooper had me step out of the truck and to the back of it. He asked me how much I had to drink that night. I told him I had not touched a drop, but I would be happy to go to jail for DUI if he would just get me out of there.
Super Trooper then asked if there was something wrong with the truck. I told him, “Mechanically, the truck is running perfectly.” He asked me why I was driving so slowly. I told him that every time I approached 35 miles per hour my mother would yell at me to slow down.
Super Trooper then asked if I was having trouble with the steering. I told him that the truck had this problem that every time I moved away from the center of the road, this alarm would go off to tell me I was getting too close to the edge of the road and that I was going to run us in the ditch.
Super Trooper said, “I guess that alarm is your mother?” I told him yes. I told him I was fully capable of driving the truck home without any intervention from my mother and that the last half hour of the journey had just about driven me crazy.
Super Trooper went to my mother’s door and asked her to step to the rear of the truck. He told her he was issuing her a warning. He told her that she was not to tell me to slow down, speed up, or otherwise tell me how to drive.
He further told her that he was going to follow us to the county line to make sure his orders were followed. He also indicated he would radio ahead to make sure the troopers between where we were and our house were alerted to the situation.
We climbed back in the truck and my mother said, “I’m sorry.” In fact, she repeated that every time we crossed a county line. Every time we passed a county line, there was a trooper or deputy somewhere just past it.
We made it home. We did not lose one single item. To this day, I have never lost anything off the back of a truck. It is a source of pride for me. And, to this day, I will not let my mother forget about this little adventure.
What about you? Do you have a driving story you would like to share with us?
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I loved this story! Typical mother/son interaction that makes me miss my son! ❤️
ReplyDeleteIt was not funny at the time. In hindsight, it was pretty funny.
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