Goodbye, You've Served Us Well

When you're driving in your car and you hear 'thud, thud, thud' and then your steering wheel starts to shake, you know this ain't going to end well. Yup, fucking flat tire. OMG, really?! Because hitting a deer last week wasn't enough bad car juju, I have to get a flat tire. FML.

After screaming at my model POS car for ten minutes, I contacted work to say that I would be MIA today. I called a tow truck and told them to pick up the car and put the spare on because I need to be able to drive it to the closest dealer to offload it. Then I strapped on my 'I'm going to be a bitch to get the best deal I can' hat, and the kids and I went car shopping. 

At the first dealer we went to, I wasn't sure about the car that I was semi-interested in so I said I'd have to think about it. The sales guy said, 'Sure, think about it and talk it over with your husband.' Then he must have seen my death stare because he added 'or talk to whoever you want about it.' The feminist inside me almost laid him out flat. Just about every car Army Boy and I bought, the one with the vagina in the relationship did the negotiating. You just lost my business, asswipe. 

The second dealer had a nice car but it was way more than I wanted to pay. In my pre-divorce semi-priveleged life, I would have been all over that loaded car like dogs on raw meat. But the practical me, who now sees $$$ everywhere, walked away. 

The third dealer had a car that I really liked. Then the sales guy asked where my husband was. I almost screamed 'WTF' and walked out but I REALLY liked the car so I just said that I was getting a divorce. Then my sweet little son put his arm around me, kissed my cheek and said, 'It's okay, Mommy, we're going to have a normal life.' The sales guy may or may not have seen bittersweet tears pop into my eyes. 

Then my daughter said, 'Whose idea was the divorce again?' I said 'Daddy's' and then my daughter said, 'Daddy made some really dumb decisions.' The sales guy definitely saw me laugh hysterically at that point. Then my daughter said, 'I wish you weren't getting a divorce. Are we poor?' The sales guy looked at me and said sympathetically, 'Kids grow up too fast.' Yes, they do. 

The story ends happily. The kids and I drove off in our new to us vehicle. We gave one last loving pat to our old mini-van, it's served us well over the last 144,000 miles. Now our family of three plus one furry friend has a new ride, and we've crossed one more bridge on the divorcing family highway.