"Drive Slow"
This weekend, Stacey and I went to a wedding. Well, perhaps "went to" is a poor choice of words. We were really only at the reception. Well, we never went in, and we didn't get any cake, but we were still totally there, man! Well, sort of.
In truth, we spent our Saturday evening each behind the steering wheel of a 15-passenger van shuttling wedding reception guests between a nearby parking lot and the home where the reception was being held. Despite the potential for disaster, the worst thing that happened was that the vans didn't have a tape deck for me plug my iPod into, thus rendering me unable to subject my passengers to the soothing sounds of Van Halen's "Eruption" pumped up to 11 on the stereo. Instead, we opted for a local radio station that played what I can sensitively describe as Mexican circus music.
Actually, I just remembered that Stacey hit a wheelbarrow right as we were parking the vans at the end of the night. Way to end the night on a high note, baby!
The job itself — driving from point A to point B, and back again...and again...and again — wasn't that taxing, but by the end of the evening, I was wishing I had taken Stacey's semi-joking suggestion to heart and put up a sign that said "NO SMALL TALK ALLOWED!"
I'm an introvert and often just holding conversations with random people at any given length of time sucks more energy out of me than trying to lift a two-ton car with nothing but my bare hands. Every time I'd pass Stacey on the road between the house and the office park where the guests' cars were, she'd be waving her hands around and yammering away, as if in the middle of an enthralling conversation with old friends, while I'd be clutching the steering wheel and trying my best to be polite. I managed a few jokes (telling one vanload of folks that I'd only had two wrecks all evening!), but I'm sure I wasn't the highlight of their night.
In the end, we got paid (the impetus causing us to take this random odd job), and nobody died. Maybe it wasn't a "good" night, but it was a success.
After all, the last time someone in my family drove a 15-passenger van, my older brother ended up in the hospital.
In truth, we spent our Saturday evening each behind the steering wheel of a 15-passenger van shuttling wedding reception guests between a nearby parking lot and the home where the reception was being held. Despite the potential for disaster, the worst thing that happened was that the vans didn't have a tape deck for me plug my iPod into, thus rendering me unable to subject my passengers to the soothing sounds of Van Halen's "Eruption" pumped up to 11 on the stereo. Instead, we opted for a local radio station that played what I can sensitively describe as Mexican circus music.Actually, I just remembered that Stacey hit a wheelbarrow right as we were parking the vans at the end of the night. Way to end the night on a high note, baby!
The job itself — driving from point A to point B, and back again...and again...and again — wasn't that taxing, but by the end of the evening, I was wishing I had taken Stacey's semi-joking suggestion to heart and put up a sign that said "NO SMALL TALK ALLOWED!"
I'm an introvert and often just holding conversations with random people at any given length of time sucks more energy out of me than trying to lift a two-ton car with nothing but my bare hands. Every time I'd pass Stacey on the road between the house and the office park where the guests' cars were, she'd be waving her hands around and yammering away, as if in the middle of an enthralling conversation with old friends, while I'd be clutching the steering wheel and trying my best to be polite. I managed a few jokes (telling one vanload of folks that I'd only had two wrecks all evening!), but I'm sure I wasn't the highlight of their night.
In the end, we got paid (the impetus causing us to take this random odd job), and nobody died. Maybe it wasn't a "good" night, but it was a success.
After all, the last time someone in my family drove a 15-passenger van, my older brother ended up in the hospital.
posted by Carter at 7:41 PM
3 Comments:
Just for the record the wheelbarrow was old and from the junk pile and we got paid a lot. I thought it was a fun night.
No comment.
Ouch. Thanks for the memories.
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