I Can’t Believe She Said That!

My mother never learned how to drive. She did however have plenty to say about how other people drove.

I remember, as if it were yesterday the first time I heard my mother offering transportation advice.

I was probably 10 years old. My parents and I were returning from my Father’s Pharmacy in Brooklyn, to our home in Queens. I had taken that route many times without any notice of the roads we took.

We were stopped at a red light at the entrance to what then was called the Interboro Pkwy. It was an exceptionally long light. A vehicle pulled up next to us on the passenger side and signaled for my mother to roll down the window. The man asked her if this was the way to get to a certain area in Queens and instead of saying yes, my mother launched into this detailed explanation of the route.

Right before the light changed, for some inexplicable reason, my mother looked at the man in all seriousness and said, “Have you got a car?” My father and I looked at each other and started laughing. The man looked at my mother and rolled up his window and sped away the second the light changed. Although cars behind us starting honking their horns, my dad couldn’t stop laughing. I almost peed in my pants. Poor mom, she knew what she meant but it came out wrong. Pkways in NYC do not allow commercial vehicles, they must take expressways, She wasn’t sure if the vehicle the man drove was commercial or not. I know there is a lot lost in translation, but if you can picture a dignified woman in her 50s asking a man sitting in his car if he has one, well I still laugh when I think about it.

When my stay in Europe was at an end, the last letter I received from my father was very strange. He sent a cartoon type picture of a native American sitting in a canoe. He had cut out the cartoon and drew wheels under it. He wrote, “I hope you have miles and miles of happiness.” I had no idea what it meant. Dad was like that though, very cute, creative and funny. I thought he probably was saying, have a good trip home.

Nothing more was said about it. I arrived home, was insulted immediately about my weight, had my mother propose, and we finally reached our street. In the driveway was a beautiful brand new car! I asked if someone was in our house. Then I realized what that last letter meant. They had bought me my first car! Not a car I would have chosen, but it was mine and it was beautiful. It was a 1966 Chevy Impala. It was huge! My mother tried to explain that she thought it was a small, safe car because it was only was a two door! I loved that car! Oh yeah, I knew you had to put gas in the car, I knew about air pressure in the tires. What I didn’t know, and no body told me was that you had to change the oil! I was driving to work one day on North Shore Pkwy. I got about half way to my destination and my car just dropped dead! A cop again came to rescue me, but the car was a goner. I had had it for quite a while, and it died from neglect about the oil. I didn’t blame myself, I blamed my husband, I blamed my dad and I blamed the universe. No one ever told me!