TheBanyanTree: I got his!!

[David]

Spin, “I got this”, cornfield.

A Kia Soul is basically a box with wheels directly under the occupants 
of the car. Hitting a pile of snow at 65 mph in one of these vehicles 
has a very predictable outcome. Why there was a pile of snow on route 12 
two miles out of Kankakee Illinois, when the rest of the Illinois 
highways were clear, is something the snowplow driver would have to 
answer. It was his pile. He did leave it for us.

I’ve lived my entire life in the northern half of the temperate 
deciduous forests and grew up driving in the snow. My father grew up 
driving in the snow. His father grew up driving in the snow. My snow 
driving expertise is my heritage. Only I wasn’t driving.

Spin, “I got this”, cornfield.

Alyssa was driving. I was tired of driving so Alyssa was driving. Alyssa 
is a 23 year old hippie who has limited experienced driving in the snow. 
But, there was no snow, not on the roads, so I felt safe. So did the 
hippie girl more than thirty years my junior.

I am a nontraditional student at a community college over run by twenty 
something females and at the ripe old age of 53 have somehow acquired a 
vast army of twenty something female friends. The college offers jobs, 
classes, projects, and clubs to interact with other students. Over the 
years this army multiplied into a force to be reckoned with. My Facebook 
feed looks like a constant music festival is taking place. But Alyssa is 
the only hippie. Maybe the only hippie in Illinois. Maybe the last 
hippie in the world.

Spin, “I got this”, cornfield.

The inevitable outcome of the Kia Soul hitting a pile of snow at 65 mph 
would be the flip. The roll. A top heavy box somehow going end over end 
hopefully coming to rest on what would be left of the tires. This was 
the direction we were heading. First the shock of the snow pile. Then 
the spin. The Kia turned 180 degrees, and at that point Alyssa decided 
she wasn’t ready for the next 180, grabbed the wheel, and shouted, “I 
got this!”, gaining enough control enough to guide the Kia into the 
adjoining cornfield.

This caught the attention of the snowplow driver, who, probably feeling 
responsible, came to our aid, explaining it was possible to push the car 
out of the cornfield to the side road that ran perpendicular to the highway.

“I’m sorry. You look sturdy enough to do such a thing. I’ve spent the 
last thirty or so years abusing my body with drugs, alcohol, cigarettes, 
and Netflix. I’ll call a tow truck.” But he was adamant. He had won 
Alyssa over and she was very persuasive. So was her friend Erica, who 
was asleep in the back during all of this.

Erica is not a hippie. She’s more like a vampire. And a thin stick 
figure of a girl who worked out her sudden bout of panic attacks by 
helping Alyssa push the Kia across the couple hundred yards of snow 
covered cornfield to the side road. I helped in the limited fashion my 
sad state of a physical body would allow. In the end none of us could 
speak through the coughing and spitting.

Dear Alyssa,

Navigating my piece of shit Kia out of a 360 spin without flipping it, 
landing upright in a cornfield with no damage, and no one hurt, was 
nothing less than extraordinary. If I’m ever lucky enough to hear you 
announce that you’ve “got” something in the future, I’ll know to be 
ready to experience greatness.

Thank you,

Dave