Another Hour in the Car
The weather has suddenly turned cold. Crank on the heat, wait for the car to warm up. While she waits, she fiddles with her iPhone, looking for the podcast on Don Quixote she has to listen to in order to prepare for her class. It’s been hard, teaching the book for the first time, and if she has to spend an hour in the car before class, unable to read, she can at least listen to what others have to say about the book. But she’s upset that she has to give up her hour, an hour that she usually gets for herself.
The inside of her car is grey. So grey. Why do the insides of cars always have to be so drab, she wonders. Grey at least hides most of the dirt. Four years ago when they bought the car, it was so clean, almost brand new. Everything was new; new marriage, new city, new possibilities. They were starting a life together. This car has been the one other constant. It drove them to California, all over the state, to her first job, to the hospital to deliver their daughter, then to Florida for another chance, now to Kentucky. Maybe the inside of the car is grey so that we can more easily imprint our lives, our own color.
Windows are clear, time to drive. It’s still dark. She watches the sun come up behind her as she drives to work. She wishes she could share the moment with her husband. They’ve shared so many sunrises and sunsets, storms and sunny weather. If they could be here, together, alone, to think together, to talk together, she could be happy. Happier, in any case. Maybe more stable. But their lives have been so scattered. This car, this marriage, they’ve survived.
He usually drives. But she is the navigator. He might claim to be the better driver, and he can certainly spot a cop before she can, but while she drives, she can hold a lot more in her head that he can. She has a terrible sense of direction and distance, so she knows routes, exits, landmarks, associations, paying attention to everything around her. Somehow she knows who is going to cut her off, who is going to swerve, who is going to slow down and get in the way. When she’s not driving, she’s still in charge of driving. He sits back and drives, but she tells him what to do, watches his back.
She should be paying attention to Don Quixote. But the discussion is so inane. She was hoping so something more substantive. But instead she gets undergrads wondering aloud if the book is really all that significant, because, like, you know, it’s really long. Was this what she was like as an undergrad? No, she was too busy getting drunk to even come up with something that insightful. How did I ever get into grad school, she wondered. At the end of the day, this is what she loves to do, this is what she’s really good at. Few things in this life have ever really made her happy, made her feel like she belonged. When she swam. When she coached. When she got married. When she teaches. When she reads literature. She’s still not so sure about being a mother.
The car seats are empty. There’s a smaller pink one for her two and a half year old daughter. A giant blue one for her 9-month-old son. It was his sister’s. The two-year-old never stops talking. She was born in California, and has grown up in the car. Her brother hates the car. Although he does enjoy sitting next to his sister and just watches her talk and play. Everyone tells her how wonderful her kids are, what a great job she must be doing; she isn’t so sure. She thinks the kids are thriving in spite of her, not because of her. She used to drive up and down a hill near their home, trying to get her daughter to fall asleep. They tried that with their son with less success. When they took his small car seat out of the car, there was vomit sprayed all over the door. The car has absorbed a lot of laughter, but it has absorbed a lot of screams. Probably more screams.
She’s panicking. She can’t teach today, she won’t have enough to say, they’ll all see through her as a fraud. She wants to teach them how to think differently about literature, how to make connection. She fears that all they are getting is what is coming out of her mouth. She’s trying to teach them how to fish, all they’re doing is taking the fish to eat. She has always loved to read. To talk and to teach about literature ignites something within her. She knows that she loves what she does. She has driven hours and hours and hours to be able to do what she loves. This car should get an honorary degree. Like one of those cartoons, the car can read and write better than some people. Dr Car. The wise old car, ready to offer homespun advice to anyone who needs it. She’s teaching satire. Is this a satire? What vice or folly would the character of the car look to correct? Damn. It all comes back to the class, to teaching, to the academic’s brain.
She can read, read and re-read. She can figure it out, make connections, put it all together, take it all apart again. But if she’s wrong, it’s not the end of the world. As a professor, she knows that it’s not the end of the word. But as a parent? She can’t figure anything out, and it’s the lives of her children she holds in her hands. As a wife? She could lose the most important person in her life. She tells her students that it’s ok to make mistakes and that there are no right answers. No, wait, there are a variety of right answers. She says that to reassure them in her class, to get them to take intellectual chances. It paralyzes her in life, unable to take chances, or even sometimes do what needs to be done. What if I’m wrong, she thinks.
Focus on the book, get through the one hour and fifteen minute class. Listen to the podcast, get what you can. Stay one step ahead of them, and you’ll be fine. You never thought you’d ever be able to drive a car, even be able to pass your license test. And yet, here you are, driving to your job, your dream job. You can teach Don Quixote, and next time you teach it, you’ll be better. Keep driving to work, teach, and drive home. For an hour and fifteen minutes, you’re a teacher. Then, go home and be a mother and wife again.
