Car Safety

Today I heard that a new state law is in effect: EVERYONE in the car, regardless of seat location, must wear a seat belt. My first reaction was to wonder how people in Texas are going to install seat belts in the beds of trucks. Then I wondered if the wonder twins, Doug and Tex, were going to need some sort of special doggy-belt and doggy-seat.*

This law also got me waxing nostalgic. It effectively puts the final coffin nails in the last chapter of "Unsafe Car Riding Practices"**, which was a freely distributed tome during my childhood. I remember being free to move about the cabin in the 70's, all whilst inhaling unfiltered cigarette smoke. Those were the days when the captain NEVER turned on the "Fasten Seat belt" or "No Smoking" signs.

I remember, vividly, the game between my father, brother and me that would occur on car trips. Of course, it was FUN for me and my brother. My Father, however, should have had fourteen coronaries for every road adventure, because, for him, this would have been an appropriate response to being slowly tortured to death on the way to our family vacations in our 1970's-era, solid heavy metal, death trap of a car. It went like this:

Dad: "Quiet down back there."
Mom: "I don't see where we are on the map." (We were perpetually lost in my childhood.)
Dad (pointing to somewhere in Illinois though we were currently in Michigan): "We're there."
Mom: "But that's Illinois."

This little banter would go on for awhile before Dad pulled over to the side of the road, took the map from Mom, figured out where we were and where we were going, then gave the map BACK to Mom.

Poor Mom. She was hopelessly map-illiterate for all of my childhood. And Dad was a "half-full" kind of map relinquisher, who figured "THIS trip she'll get the hang of it."***

Now, in the back seat, we still hadn't quieted down. And we were like monkeys in an invisible cage, bounded by the front seat, back doors, and the rear windshield. We'd bounce around, scream, throw things, and paint an invisible line on the back seat whenever we got tired of each other. Then we'd announce "Don't go over that line." Of course, the other did, and that brought screams of "MAAAAHHHHHMMMMOOOOMMMM. She crossed the line."****

Dad (irritated voice): "I thought I told you to quiet down?!"
Kids, bouncing: "OK"*****.
Dad: "I'm serious."
Kids: no response. Still bouncing. Now hitting.
Dad: "DON'T MAKE ME PULL THIS CAR OVER."
Kids: still no response. Bouncing, hitting, and screaming now.
Dad: "I'VE HAD IT!"

Upon hearing that phrase, kids would scatter, because we knew what was next. An arm, much like the tentacle of the giant squid in "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea", was about to makes its way over the front seat, searching for whatever prey it could get its suckers on. It's entire purpose: to get us to SHUT THE HECK UP.

To paint the picture a little more vividly, Dad is six foot four. He wears a size 15 shoe. His arms are LONG. So you knew certain death was about to visit you if you didn't move QUICKLY.

Whoever was lucky enough to get the back windshield ledge and play dead was out of reach. But the poor sucker who hit the floor or backed into the seat was just completely at the mercy of the Gods. You could flatten like a pancake and that hand might still hit you smack dab in the face. Sometimes, if you didn't breathe, that helped, because you weren't giving any indication of location to the tentacled-one.

Usually the car would quiet down after this little game. Then, undoubtedly, one of us would ask "Where are we?" Mom, map in hand, had not a clue but, I imagine, a raging headache. Dad, still winded from the giant squid imitation, was too irritated to respond.

So then the questioning would hit nails-on-a-chalkboard level, with the inevitable "Are we there yet?"

Now, in all my years as a parent, in retort to this annoying question, I have wanted to say, in an oh-so-patient voice, with the look of an angel on my face, "Children, if we were THERE, we wouldn't be HERE. Since we are HERE, we can't possibly be THERE. Once we get THERE, we won't be HERE anymore. So, in the HERE and NOW, please shut your mouth until we get THERE."

Back to the 70's: there were always the complaints of I'm hungry, thirsty, bored, tired, and the happiest one, "I'm going to throw-up." That would be my younger brother, who had the unfortunate habit of getting car sick. Back in the day, since I had yet to experience my own kids with very sensitive gag reflexes, the thought of being a possible vomit victim was horrendous, unfathomable, and downright proposterous. This greatly increased the chances of my parents hearing the "Are we there yet?" line of questioning, as I wanted to get away from barf boy as quickly as humanly possible.

Through all the road trips we took as a family, none of us ever said anything that sent anybody else to a psychiatrist. I'd like to think we had fun while getting on each other's nerves, the way most Americans who vacationed via car did in the 70's and 80's.

Today I thank goodness for airplanes. They make getting THERE pretty quick. Nobody has to rely on map-reading skills, wrong turns are almost non-existent, and, goshdarnit, it's just fun to look out the window at our beautiful country.

Best of all, an airplane is a smoke-free environment, where I can simply sit back, seat belt firmly fastened, have a drink and relax.

Because I KNOW giant squids don't exist at 30,000 feet.


*If PETA has anything to do with it, this will be law next month.

**Not a real book, just a title that encompasses the attitude of the 70's: "I wonder what these things are doing in here?" (sound of seatbelt hitting floor of car.)

***Fast forward 35 years and they are now in possession of a GPS. I'd like to thank the inventor for saving my parents from killing each other during some random road trip. I'm executor of the will and I don't have time to deal with all the paperwork a double-homicide would induce.

****Notice I used a feminine pronoun here. This could have easily been "he". My brother was just as much at fault as I was.

*****This response was a blantant lie. We filtered out anything from the front seat of the car, besides the music coming from the "state-of-the-art" AM/FM, 8-track player.