Sorrelly part 2

I talked to my mom last night and she disputed some of the facts in my posts.  Like she said that she held Olivia and didn't put her on the floor of the wagon.  I don't know; I was four.  I told her that she should write her own stories because since I've written them, that's history.

Sometimes my parents tell me I have a creative memory.  I am just glad they're calling me creative!

Between Marianne applying make-up while driving and the stories I'll write today, you may come to the conclusion that she was a bad driver.  I wasn't around for all the crashes Olivia had or else you'd realize it is all relative...  (Look at me, making both my sisters mad in just two sentences.)

We hit hapless animals:

Late one night Marianne was driving us home from our jobs working as waitresses at the Ranch House Hotel and Casino, in Wells which was half an hour away from home.  We always left work exhausted with tired feet and smelling like ash trays since we'd had cigarette smoke blown in our faces for 8 hours.  We sang to keep ourselves awake.

One night, in front of our uncle Demar's house, a huge buck jumped in front of us on the road.  We had no choice but to hit it.  It careened over the top of us and we spun around 180 degrees.  Demar and our cousin Lincoln heard the crash and came out to check on us.  Besides us being extremely terrified, the deer was the only one that sustained much damage (sadly, it died).  As far as Sorrelly was concerned, the letters C H E V R O L E T were across the hood.  The E fell off.

That car was a tank.

We avoided hitting a lot of animals:

Especially after that crash, I was a vigilant watcher for deer while we drove.  I watched like it was my life on the line because it kind of was.  There weren't just deer in our path though.  There were rabbits and coyotes and sometimes cows.  Another time, again late at night when we were returning from waitressing, we rounded a bend and were greeted by a huge black steer standing in the middle of the road.  Marianne managed to avoid hitting it but she stopped the car because I was screaming.  I couldn't stop.  She shook me.  "Stop screaming!" she said.  "We're fine."

So I did.  Older sisters are a good invention and I had learned their counsel should be heeded.

We crashed in the snow:

It was late on a Saturday and we were on our way home after a long bus trip from a basketball game.  The roads were treacherous with packed snow and sheets of ice.  At a certain corner, the car fishtailed.  Marianne frantically tried to regain control but we were suddenly sliding into a huge snow bank.  As Marianne turned the wheel, trying to get on the road Sorrelly whirled in a complete circle and finally collided with a tremendous drift.  We were both shaking and terrified as we asked each other what had happened and if we were OK.

We climbed out of the car to find Sorrelly hopelessly stuck in deep snow.  "What are we going to do?" I asked Marianne.  She was usually so in control and capable at such times, but she didn't know what to do and that scared me.  We were about five miles from home and the temperature was well below freezing.  I stamped my feet and kicked at the snow clutching our tires while I waited for Marianne's plan.  We decided to try to dig it out even though we didn't have a shovel.  We knelt side by side in the snow and cleared away some of the bigger chunks.  It was futile; all we succeeded in doing was soaking our jeans and feet.

"We have to walk," I told Marianne in desperation.

"No," she said, "We'll freeze.  It's too far and too cold."  It was after 1:30 in the morning by then.

"We're going to freeze anyway," I complained.  I had visions of our family finding us frozen stiff the next morning on their way to church.

"Let's pray," Marianne said, taking my gloved hands in hers.  She whispered a soft prayer in a trembling voice.  "Daddy will come," she said after she was done, "We called from town and they know what time to expect us."  (This was our system back in the old days before cell phones.  We'd call from a pay phone and tell them when we were leaving town.)

I was skeptical.  "What if they went back to sleep?" I asked.  She put her arms around me and we huddled in the dark car, waiting.

We sat there for what seemed like a very long time but probably wasn't.  Finally we saw headlights across the valley, a few miles away.  We knew it was our dad.  No one else would be on the road at that time of night.  We kept our eyes on those lights.  The car came to a stop a little ways from ours and we joyfully ran to our dad.  I had never been so glad to see anyone.  He extended a long arm to each of us and held us to his broad chest in a huge embrace.

He, of course, had a shovel.