There she is, a 1963 Ford Falcon station wagon… complete with wood on the sides.
I don’t have to tell you this was more than slightly mortifying to a teenager. The Falcon was a lot of things, but cool wasn’t one of them.
That picture was taken in the late eighties… judging from the head to toe acid washed denim… and yes, my mother was still driving her. She grew up in NYC where no one in her era drove or even bothered to learn. The woman got her first license when she moved to the suburbs at age 40 right before I was born and didn’t enjoy it. She was a nervous and overly cautious motorist and never felt comfortable behind the wheel. She learned to drive in that Falcon and it was literally the only car she ever drove her entire life.
It had vacuum wipers, no seatbelts, an am radio, a manual choke and by the time I drove her? A top speed of 51 before she started to rattle so badly you had to slow down. It was a good thing we lived on the Island because the old girl would never have tolerated a highway.
On an overcast and dreary day, my husband went out back to battle the trees.
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If you remember, we planted 6 trees in the north forty 2 years ago. Four maples and two cherries. The maples are thriving, the cherries are dead… thanks in no small part to the deer who apparently see cherry wood and think “snack time”!
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Dry and brittle, my husband thought it would be a simple thing to rip them out of the ground.
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He was mistaken.
Our miserable backyard clay was not letting go.
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He pulled, he tugged, he dug, and finally resorted to sawing them down.
It’s less embarrassing than an enema, but only just.
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I have a long list of bonehead moves but my most recent was a few years back. I’d pulled into a bank’s ATM machine… it was next to their drive thru window and on top of a short hill. For whatever reason, I wasn’t paying attention and when I realized I was too far away to reach the machine I opened my door, dropped my card and leaned out to retrieve it….
Without putting the car in park.
On a hill.
Not my brightest move.
Gravity is indeed a fickle b*tch… because the car went rolling, and so did I. Fell right out of the car on my knees and was dragged alongside it until I managed to reach in and push the brake. Unfortunately not before the left front fender slid along the concrete barrier and went crunch.
The drive thru teller saw the whole thing and half the bank emptied out in the parking lot to make sure I was okay. Other than a ripped knee on my jeans, the only thing hurt was my pride because I felt like a right royal idiot.
As soon as I got home the local police called and made me go downtown to fill out an accident report. When the officer asked what happened… I told him I had a blonde moment.
A moment that cost me over $1,800 in body work.
Duh.
Now you.
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