1961

I cannot remember a time when I was not fascinated with driving.  On my seventh birthday, I received my first big girl bike and got all bloodied up learning, by darn, how to ride the thing!  It was the color of creamed peas and it had huge tube tires.  Boys all over my neighborhood always rode up and down the sidewalks "driving" their bikes with one hand, like my daddy drove our car; so, that was my short term mission in life -to maneuver my bike, one-handed and confident, like Mario Andretti, up and down every sidewalk in my world.

Through the years I kept up with the makes and models of cars, also.  I am from the '57 Chevy days and was in high school when Ford introduced the Mustang.  Daddy used to let me sit on his lap and drive, and I was really pretty coordinated.  By the time I was thirteen, I was able to stay on the road and even manipulate a standard transmission without breaking the necks of everyone in the car!

Daddy bought Mother a 1950 Chrysler as a second car in 1961.  With its big rounded forest green body and large onimous headlights, it looked like one of those large green beetles that fly clumsily into your face in the summer.  When I climbed into the seat I was perched high above the sleeker cars of the late 50's and early 60's. The steering wheel had so much play in it, I felt like I was turning a screw that had been stripped of its tread every time I rounded a corner.  But, it became my "ride" at thirteen years old.  Mother had such trouble with back pain that I drove it more than she did although I did not yet have a driver's license.

There was a dark period of time when Mother seemed always ill.  At times she would stay in bed for some days and we girls tended to things.  I really do not know what was wrong with her exactly.  Her face was often etched with pain and there was little joy registered on it.  I think now that much of what manifested in her body was the result of great soul-weariness and heartache seeping to the surface.  Many doctors diagnosed her problems as "nerves."  There was, however, much relief for her physical pain when she discovered Dr. Morris and chiropractic medicine.  It was to his office that Mother had me drive one evening when Daddy was out of town.  The nausea that accompanied her back and neck pain was just too much to bear; and, I was her only transportation to the doctor.  My middle-child-make-everything-all-right mentality kicked in as I threw off my pajamas, hurriedly dressed, found the car keys, helped Mother out of bed and into her robe, and headed for the giant green bug parked outside.  I remember feeling proud that I could take care of her; I felt capable because she felt I was.  Carefully, I chauffered my mother to her doctor and delivered her unscathed into his healing hands.  Relief poured over me like an anointing oil, beginning with my head and flowing over my shoulders and down to my churning stomach.  I was part Wonder Woman - part taxi driver.  I felt appointed to secure her safety for the rest of my life.

I watched as Dr. Morris manipulated her back and pulled her neck quickly taut, turning it first to the left and then to the right, feeling for some magic place on her neck with his fingers that signaled to him the precise moment to "adjust" her. At long last, when Mother had been pulled, pushed and cracked, Dr. Morris used his thumbs to press down and down, until she almost screamed, on pressure points in her neck and then release and brusquely rub the spot out with his hand.  This treatment, however, did not shock me; I had been adjusted several times myself; the only part I hated was having to lie still in a quiet little room for what seemed hours afterward.

I waited in the darkened, night-time foyer for Mother to rest in her cubicle.  Thirteen-year-old girls are notoriously self-absorbed, and I was no exception.  Though I was concerned for my mother, I felt really grown up that evening.  Mother had depended upon me in her time of need, and I had come through, brilliantly, it seemed.  Daddy would be proud of me, though the Fort Worth police department might not have been so gracious should I have plowed into a licensed driver on the way home.  Thankfully, a nausea-free, relaxed Mother was deposited back into her bedroom safe and sound; I returned to pajamas and homework.

Daddy was proud of me; but he sold insurance and knew what would happen if I were ever stopped for a traffic violation.  Because Mother's health was so unstable, the FWPD issued me an emergency license after I passed the driver's test.  The only thing I remember from the test was startling myself and the police officer by parallel parking correctly on my first and only try. 

My premier outing with my brand new license resting tenuously in my purse was to transport my mother, my  aunt and my grandmother to separate doctors' offices and then retrieve them when they were done.  Mother was to go to the chiropractor and my aunt and grandmother to the oncologist.  Grandmother, who was in her eighties, had a lump in her breast, and Aunt Taulee was accompanying her to the doctor's consultation convened after her biopsy.   No one was confident the outcome would be positive, and my aunt did not want to drive home with devastating news riding shotgun.

Responsible -I needed to be responsible and make the news Grandmother Berrier would receive somehow bearable.  I loved my grandmother with such a deep gratitude and respect.  She had stayed with a difficult man several years her senior through the vicissitudes of life and somehow borne his daily accusations of infidelity during his declining, demented years with grace and mercy, though her heart ached with the injustice of his words.  With patience and great love, Grandmother had spent many summer days teaching me to sew - iron the seams open an stitch down their edges; make certain when cutting the patterns the lines of the fabric match up perfectly; hem-stitch everything by hand, making sure to catch only a thread of the material so that the stitch cannot be detected on the front surface of the garment. I watched "Lawrence Welk" and "Days of Our Lives" with her, and she thought the soaps were real.  Grandmother would have loved reality television.

I picked Mother up first then Grandmother and Aunt Taulee.  Because of Grandmother's deep faith in Christ and her advanced age, she seemed to handle the news of her diagnosis with aplomb.  Breast cancer had indeed invaded her body.  The old green auto chugged along with all four of us in tow.  The silence in the car belied the noisy talk clambering inside of our heads.  We had all seen Aunt Rene die, long and slow, and the memory of the pungent odor of raw liver and carrot juice, with all its sensory connotations, penetrated my consciousness as a sickening reminder of her valiant efforts at defeating the cell-destroying enemy that finally conquered her.  My view of the road blurred as I blinked back the evidence of my fears for my grandma. I do not remember who actually spoke first, but ultimately the two sisters and their mother talked of surgery and recovery; and, I kept my hands on a wobbling steering wheel and drove them home.

Perhaps it was because I was the driver that I felt responsible for the news, somehow.  Or maybe it was because I was so periphery to the actual pain Grandmother must be feeling.  I pulled the car into our driveway and Mother and I stepped out, took deep breaths, and went inside.  Honestly, I felt as though I had hoed somebody's back forty, I was so tired.  Emotionally spent, I headed to the kitchen to help Mother make dinner.  The phone rang.  Friends from church had a stranded son and wondered if I would go to the school, pick him up and take him home.  Back in the car again.  But the aura in the old Chrysler had remained trapped inside the locked car when we exited, and I felt once more the heaviness of the afternoon.  I also had not had time to settle myself from rushing to and from doctor's offices trying to get everyone somewhere on time.  Here I was again - Hurry up!! Don't be late!  The school was not far away.  The task, easy.  I dropped the boy off at his house and went inside to greet his father for a moment.  There were bags of groceries around the kitchen and backpacks on the floor.  The family was leaving for the weekend.  Sounded fun.  Have a great time!

Back in the car. Turn on the engine.  Roll down the window and shout farewell to the boy's waving father.   "Drive carefully this weekend!" I was smiling as I roll out of the driveway. BAM!  Tires squeal! The old car fish-tails slightly.  I stomp mushy brakes. Metal bumper thuds against metal bumper.  A lady is screaming as a car door slams. "My baby! My baby!" she is shouting.  I am out of the car now and the man to whom I have just waved good-bye has ironically espied me driving "not so carefully" out of his driveway, and he is running toward me to assess the damage done to the car of this hysterical woman frantically checking out her bewildered three-year-old son.  It appears I have scraped her bumper with mine.  The boy is unhurt, but the mother is ready to kill me!  "Why did you not look where you were going?"  I dunno.....I was saying good-bye, telling him to drive safely...I dunno.  "You could have killed me and my kid!"  Stupid.  I was really stupid.  That had to be the best reason I could come up with, but I did not say anything to the woman because I did not know what to say.

I had tried so hard all day to keep a lid on my emotions.  Stoically, I walked back into the house I had just exited and called my daddy.  I did not know what to do with the angry woman standing at the end of this man's driveway.  I wanted to be conscientious and do the correct thing, but I was thirteen and naive and, really, I just wanted to go home.  Daddy was still at work.  The phone rang there for such a long time, but I knew when he answered exactly what I would say:  "Daddy, I have had a minor accident here at Johnny's house and the lady whose car I rolled into is very mad at me.  What do I do?"  However, when Daddy picked up, all I could do was cry.  The sound of his voice was so comforting that I just wanted him to hug me and take care of this mess I made because I was in a hurry and my mind was full of too much business from the day.

Ultimately, I articulated through my blubbering exactly what had just happened.  Daddy asked to speak with the mad mommy, and I went home.  I felt like a stupid failure!  Somehow the messes of the day were all my fault.  I put that lie on like a dress and wore it for a while.  When my father got home he just put his arms around me and said he was proud of all I had done that day.  It was a busy, emotional day.  Don't worry about the wreck.  No one was hurt.  Everything will be okay.  Patting my back.  Don't worry.  I'll take care of this.

I believed Daddy.  I never heard anything more about it.