Okay–a few months ago, we were sitting in the lunch room and the song “Devil went down to Georgia” came up in conversation. Don’t ask me how, the gods were drinking happy juice (or, as the Samurai speculates, the four horsemen of the apocalypse came down for bong-water), but anyway, there’s this song.
And there’s me, my sarcastic, uber-organized department head and the crusty, sarcastic curmudgeon guy that I love like a brother, and we’re SINGING THE FUCKING SONG. No kidding. First word to violin solo, and that awesome last line. (I done told you once, you son of a bitch, I’m the best that’s ever been.)
And I bring this up because I had managed to persuade myself that school wasn’t really four weeks away, when I was at water aerobics, and the instructor PLAYED THAT FUCKING SONG.
Guys, if you’re out there and today you suddenly slipped into a hyperbolic turquoise paisley dream? Yeah. That was me. Thinking of you. And remembering that I do have a dayjob. *sigh* And if that’s not the devil’s work, I don’t know what is.
But now to the bulk of my entry: driving PWT.
Yes, ladies and gentleman, (okay, maybe two guys read the blog:-) I got busted driving PWT. It’s my fault, really–when you take the Lane family crap-mobile out of Citrus Heights, it gets noticed. When you take it to FOLSOM, the root of the uber-skinny stay-at-home mother with the gym membership and the shopping addiction, the polite, fresh-faced, clean-cut CHP officer is going to notice that you don’t fit in.
And then you get it. Your ticket for being Poor White Trash, just SLAPPED IN YOUR FACE, and reminding you that you don’t, nor have you ever, nor will you ever afford to, live in Folsom, where driving PWT is not allowed.
Now, the ticket didn’t SAY PWT–what it said was, “Please fix your broken tail-light, cracked windshield, expired registration, smog certificate and find your proof of insurance some time before the next apocalypse–or the end of August, depending on your willingness to drive at all.”
If that isn’t driving PWT in a yuppie SUV zone, I don’t know what is.
And if the litany of PWT transgressions wasn’t enough on paper, I had a little taste of what it’s like to be the mother of PWT at the gym today.
It started after I dried off from my aerobics class and took bathing suits and swim diapers in to the short people in the play zone. Ladybug came up to me and asked me to put on her shoes, so I dropped the bathing suits on the floor, and complied with my little Squishy Belle, and then I turned to Cave Troll and said, “Holy God, Cave Troll, put on your clothes!” because he’d stripped naked right there in the play area to put his swimsuit on without waiting for the changing room
I was, of course, mortified–but I figured, well, it’s an isolated incident.
Until after we were done swimming when I realized that I’d forgotten to bring Ladybug’s clothes in from the car.
I marched her out to the car wearing a diaper and her pretty pretty princess shoes, wondering if they made T-Shirts or had interventions for this sort of thing, or if I’m destined to be driving PWT for the rest of my life.
And what precisely is wrong with being PWT?
Besides – you guys aren’t PWT – you’re eccentric millionaires – so people who don’t like that can fold it till it’s all pointy corners, and shove it where the sun don’t shine!
Given a choice between driving wiwth a broken tail light, or knitting and writing, which would you choose? You are not poor white trash. You are delightfully Bohemian! It’s not laziness. It’s a high-minded artistic indifference to appearances. And the kids are happy. The Mate is happy. You are doing what makes you happy. So who cares what the uptight, surface-minded assholes think?
Ah yes, PWT. We used to have a car in order to start the hood had be popped, so a spark could be jumped across the solenoid in order for the car to start. At end of the car’s life in order to stop we had to use the emergancy brake.
I hate following Roxie because she says it with such flair (which is probably why she is the writer) :-)Bohemian and artistic with happy kids and Mate sounds like a good life to me!
My husband commented, “In the words of the immortal Frank Zappa, You Are What You Is and there is nothing wrong with that.
KnitTech forgot to ask so I get to, “Did you get a picture of the CHP holding the sock?”. That was her plan when we went on our trip over the 4th.
I used to drive a car that an ex-cop told me was “rolling probable cause”. I found that out one day while we were on break and he pointed to my car and said “That car is always here. I called in the tags and the driver is clean”. I looked at him and said “Thats my car we work the same shift”.
On the other hand we did share a building with the parole and probation department.