I drove today, 1st time since Feb.

[MOmomof8]

I haven't been driving or allowed to drive since I fell asleep & totaled my minivan.  That was in Feb.  I have been drive into town & back but today I drove around town.  I drove more today than I have since Feb.  It was strange to be be driving again.  Going into town I felt like I was driving like an old lady.  But when I came out of Walmart, I watched an old lady back out of a parking space.  I drive more like a teenager who is learning to drive.  I really don't like driving on state hwy AF into town.  People drive crazy on there.  It winds around & a lot of people go around those curves wide so they end up coming at you head-on.  That happened to me today.  I have really bad depth perception so I'm always afraid of going off the road. I slow down when people do that & I almost had to completely stop today.  I went to the post office first & they have parallel parking but I got lucky bc there was only one car there & I could pull into the front space.  I am not ready to start that just yet.  I remember when I was 15 & driving on a permit.  I would drive mom to the mall but she refused to let me pull into a parking space.  My depth perception was not good even then.  So when I got to a space I had to stop & let my mom park.  Her insurance man told her that looking at my driving record he would say I was a boy.  I had a lot speeding tickets & people kept hitting me.  A car backed into me, a boy on a bike hit my back driver's side fender, a woman hit me in the driver's door while I was passing her, & there are more but I don't remember the rest.  Of course, I was always in my mom's car which was 10 years newer than mine.  But she kept letting me drive her car anyway.  She had a boyfriend who thought he could win me over by letting me drive his car, NO WAY.  I couldn't stand him.  He was very bossy & acted like he was my dad.  He didn't even live with us.  I was watching TV & doing my homework one night when he came over.  He came right in & turned the channel without saying a word.  When I told him to turn it back , he said I needed to watch educational crap.  I was in school that was enough education for one day.  So we fought over the TV a short time, then I just went into my room & locked the door.  He didn't like this & told my mom to make me come out to spend time with them.  I refused so he came into my room to carry me into the living room.  I jumped to the other side of the bed & mom told me to stop it.  I started crying & begged her to make him leave me alone & not to make me be in the same room as him.  But she took his side so I gave in, crying the whole time.  He even thought telling he had just finished reading The Little House On The Prairie book series.  I told him I wasn't impressed, I read all of them in the 3rd grade.  I was happy when my mom started little me spend the night with my friend on the nights he came over.  Then once I turned 16, I would run around with my friends.  There was one night that all of us ended up at my house but no one was home.  We liked to go to my house bc I had a piano & we would all stand around it singing.  Then he & mom came in.  We usually sing way into the night, after midnight most all the time.  Well, at midnight, he decides to tell my friends they had to leave bc I had to go to bed.  He was crazy, I never went to bed until 3 am when I didn't have school.  I fought with him & looked to mom for help but again she let me down.  My friends said they would leave to keep the peace.  I told them it was my mom's & my house.  He had no say, he wasn't the boss of me.  But they left anyway.  I stepped outside the door to say my goodbyes & he comes over, slams the door & locks it.  That was the last straw for me so I kicked the door as hard as I could.  He opened the door real fast & stared yelling at my friends.  I stood up to him & told him I was the one that did it so leave my friends alone.  He thought he was all cool by letting his cigarette dangle out of his mouth while he talked.  I hate smoke in my face so I slapped it out of his mouth & it went flying across the room.  It was so quite at that moment, then my friends busted up laughing.  He ordered me to pick it up & give it back to him.  I explained why I did it & my mom told me to do as I was told, which I did bc she told me to.  My friends were afraid to leave at that point but I told them I would be fine.   When I went in I just went straight to my room, locked my door & went to be.  He left me alone the rest of the night.  This guy was a real creep.  He was a married man, didn't plan to leave his wife but kept my mom on the hook.  One night when I wasn't home they were drinking & mom fell.  She hit her head & knocked herself out.  What did he do?  He just leaves with her on the floor out cold.  He couldn't call 911 bc his wife was a nurse.  My mom was cool with that, too.  I chewed her butt out for it, told her she shouldn't see him anymore.  But she didn't listen to me.  On another night, they are at my house & drinking but I wasn't there.  The challenged each other to see who could take the most pain.  They put their arms together & dropped a lite cigarette where they were touching each other.  My mom won, of course.  He was such a boop.  She had a scare on her arm for the rest of her life.  I told her that was really stupid & if I had done something like that I would have gotten the flyswatter.  On yet another time he was at our house, my mom's car had a flat so he was going to change it.  I was just starting to change it when he pulled into the driveway.  So, him being a man, said he could do it & I couldn't.  I would hurt myself.  I had to show him how to use the jack, where to put the jack & I told him to put a the flat tire under the side of the car when he got it off.  Well, he didn't listen to me & while he was putting the good tire on, the jack fell.  He was lucky that he had the tire on the car before the jack fell bc he was sitting with his leg partially under that car.  So he did finally get it changed.  I told mom to let my friend Mike come over & make sure it was on tight.  She did listen to me that time.  She listened to me sometimes just not enough.  If you are thinking that I sound like the mom & she sounds like the daughter, it's bc we switched rolls back & forth all the time.  My mom had never had so much freedom & just didn't know how to handle it.  She made some bad choices just as if she were a teenager.  My uncle, her brother, noticed it too when we were visiting with him one day.  He told mom that she had a very grown up daughter for 16 & that knowing I was like that he wouldn't worry so much about us.  At one point I thought about calling the guys wife & I even dialed her number but I hung up when she answered.  I was afraid she might turn on mom & hurt her instead of breaking his bones.  She started seeing him less & less, finally.   We did have some good times with her dating life.  A lot of her boyfriends couldn't tell my voice from hers so they would start talking to me thinking they had her.  I stopped them really fast bc I didn't want to hear or know anything about their relationship.  She dated 2 men named Jerry so I decided to call them nice Jerry & rich Jerry.  Nice Jerry was rich but rich Jerry was boring.  She had this one boyfriend that I liked, he was funny & whatever I did he would give me money.  I got $20 for opening the door & letting him in.  I had a jean hat that he just fell in love with & had to have.  I paid $1 for it & really loved it myself.  I didn't want to sell it but when he got up to $30 I just had to give in.  When I was pregnant with my first child there was a night he came over.  He gave me $50 to just put his hand on my belly to feel the baby kick.  I did try to refuse that but he wouldn't have it.  When he found out that the baby's father didn't want anything to do with me or the baby, he wanted to go kick his butt.  I refused to tell him his name or address even though he offered me money for the information.  My mom dated some characters.  She dated a guy that was younger than her & I really liked him.  But he acted my age instead of his own.  She let him take me to a bar that was giving dance lessons.  We learned the hustle, it was so much fun.  He was friends with the owner so I got to stay until 10pm & dance.  On night when he came into my music room to say bye, He stuped down & tried to kiss me.  I knocked him on his butt & it never happened again.  They split up & he started dating the other woman that I didn't like much.  He lost his apartment so mom rented our 3rd bedroom out to him.  It was like having a big brother.  I had a new car that was loaded & he liked to go out in it.  He had an el rancho that I liked driving.   He had a CB in it & I liked talking on it.  He was so much fun.  He had to pass his women by me & he had to check out my boyfriends.  I wonder whatever happened to him.  I wonder if he ever grew up.  My teenager years may not have been normal but they sure were fun.  I got to do things that I wouldn't have been allowed to if my dad lived with us.  I had mixed feelings about the divorce but it turned out to be the best.  My dad will be another subject for a journal sometime.