Flirting with Death...or Vise Virsa

So…I spent twenty minutes today waiting for Death. Let me tell you why.

I am in the car rental biz. We do a service of picking up and dropping off customers at body shops. Today I had to pick up a woman at one of the body shops and take her back to our office to sign the paperwork. Little did I know that I was about to stare Death in the face.

When I arrived I was surprised to find that the lady was not in the waiting area of the body shop, but sitting in her car with her friend. I also noticed that she was old. She had seen 81 years pass her by, and now she was the typical grandmother type. She was short, walked slow, talked slow, and could not hear anything I asked her. None of this really phased me. I like older people, and don’t mind any of the qualities that I just mentioned. But…she had the one quality that I despise in the older folks. She was an “old driver.”

Normally, I would not even have to witness her driving habits because I am supposed to drive the customers back to the office to sign paperwork. When I told her this I could see a vision of me whipping around corners at 90 miles per hour pass across her eyes. She was having none of that. I tried to explain about liability and insurance not covering her until she signed paperwork, but she refused to let me drive. So I resigned and let her slide gingerly behind the wheel. Did I mention that I’m an idiot?

After only ten minutes of me explaining (from the back seat) that the gearshift was not on the steering column (and that the lever she was pulling was why the windshield wipers kept spraying) and showing her (with help from her equally old friend) how to work the automatic gearshift in the middle consol, we were on our way. Soon we were pulling into traffic, and I was realizing that it was possible for both my stomach to drop and for my testicles to crawl up at the same time so that they met in the middle of my abdomen to console each other.

Staring Death in the eye on normal occasions it not as scary as it may sound. This is because you typically only stare at Death for a brief moment before it either passes you by or you start playing the harp with the angels. Try sharing a back seat with Death for a twenty-minute ride. It took me only seven minutes to get from the office to the body shop, but at an average speed of a brisk 30 mph (15 under the speed limit) and the many occasions when she would slow down to 20 for those pesky curves it took us a little longer to get back. It also did not help that every time she drifted over into the oncoming lane (often) I felt Death put its hand on my leg. Cheeky bastard.

At least now I can say that I know what it feels like to have every muscle in my body tighten at the same instant. This occurred when she turned off the main road into our parking lot…..right in front of an oncoming semi. I believe that if my penis had not been trying to escape out of my asshole then I would have pissed myself.

Needless to say, I made it. I gave Death the finger as I climbed out of the back seat of the car and breathed the sweet air of (what’s that word for not dying? Oh, yeah!) life. It’s good to know that there are faithful old people out there willing to keep the stereotypes alive by driving like she did. God bless her for giving us someone to ridicule and fear at the same time.