I have owned a car only one day longer than I have worked at the 100 Mile Free Press. The cracks on my window shield are only four days younger.
In fact, my adventures in car-ownership has been tied to my first “real” job.
Let me take you back to my job interview. I was happily driving down the highway from Williams Lake to 100 Mile House in my grandmother’s van.
As I curved around the corner past the 108, I got a sinking feeling. Literally.
With a thump, the front end of the van slumped to the ground as I looked out my right window, where the van wheel, cartoonishly, had continued without me, happily rolling down the road to my side, across the road and up the snowy embankment, leaving me without a ride into my job interview and without a phone to contact my potential employers.
Somehow, and thanks to the kind soul from the 108 who gave me a ride into town, they still hired me.
Probably their first mistake.
Two weeks later I had happily purchased my first car: complete with hand window cranks, no fob and not even air conditioning.
My first day of work I was up early, ready to drive again from Williams Lake to 100 Mile.
A heavy snowfall had happened the night before and as I cleaned about 3 inches of fluffy powder off my car, ready to get going, I failed to notice that as I rigorously waved the brush back and forth, the keys to my car went sailing out of my hand, sinking somewhere into a powder-filled parking lot.
I don’t think my boyfriend was amused when I woke him up in a panic to search for car keys under a new snowfall.
Luckily my parents, only the night before, had reminded me that it is not a smart idea to keep your spare key on the same key chain as your current key, although I can’t imagine they were amused when I called them to ask them to drive the key over so I could get to work.
I now have approximately five keys, scattered around the Cariboo, based on my inability to remember to take my key with me as I leave the vehicle.
This is easier than those who have the fortune to own a fob might think (or at least that’s what I tell myself).
Somehow, these keys are never exactly where I need them. Over 72 hours, I once locked my keys in my car on voting day, where my grandma rescued me, at the cherry stand, where my boyfriend’s BCAA saved the day, and at the Chartreuse Moose, where I locked both my key and my spare in the vehicle.
Too afraid to bother my less-patient-than-he-used-to-be boyfriend, my dad drove from Williams Lake to rescue me.
Perhaps it makes sense now why my grandmother still will not let me drive her head-turning cherry-red, equipped-with-heated-cup-holders Dodge Charger. I probably wouldn’t let me drive it either.