56. Turning the Corner
There is a point to this blog, but it’s gonna take a while for us to get there.
I used to own a Datsun 280Z sports car. I originally named her Zelda, but that was shortened to Z within a matter of weeks. I’m going to tell you more about Z, but first things first.
I’m one of those people who names their cars. The practice began in 1976 when I bought my first car — a very used 1963, pale yellow Bel Air I named Bonnie Bell Air. Sad to admit, the Bonnie Bell part came from my lip gloss. (Facepalm). The behemoth had a steering wheel the size of a Ferris wheel, a v.e.r.y. l.o.n.g. tail end, a black-soft-top, and supposedly power steering. She. Did. Not. Have. Power. Steering. After a year of driving Bonnie, there was a noticeable change to my shoulders and biceps. They’d broadened and toned way too much for my liking — think Bulgarian shot putter in training.
I only drove Bonnie to and from work because my friends had cool cars and my dates had cool cars — and their cool cars didn’t require two people to start them. Bonnie needed a start-crew of two: one person to hold a screwdriver to the battery while the other person turned the key. An annoyance for sure, but there was no shortage of guys who’d stop at the yellow Bel Air when its hood was in the upright position, and its owner was taking a hip to the bumper waiting patiently for an assist.
Bonnie and I parted ways when her exhaust fumes became unbearable and I just could not shake the constant fear that I’d be found passed out at a red light and slumped over the Ferris wheel. More to the point — and this is a very important point — it was nearly impossible finding a perfume strong enough, yet flirty enough, to cut the petrol smell that wafted from inside Bonnie Bell. I preferred wearing Charlie back then, but all things considered, White Shoulders was a much better spritz.
So, what’s a girl to do?
Out with the old — in with the brand spanking new.
My first brand new car was a 1980 2-door, black Chevy Nova SS — Now. We’re. Talking. This sporty little number had a very nice interior: a simple dashboard with an appropriately sized steering wheel, black vinyl split-bench seats with a tiny bit of red piping along the edges, and a standard H-stick shift. For some reason, an oversized white ball was mounted at the top end of the shift. The functionality of the ball was clear — the person shifting the gears had something to grab onto. The design element left a lot to be desired and the color choice very easily could have been a dealbreaker. I mean, come on. A black and red sporty little number with a hideously sized white ball at the end of a long piece of steel. WTF?
Within days, I’d sanded the shiny object and painted the ball black. Easy-peasy. As for the exterior of my first major purchase — it was beautiful. It was shiny black with red detail striping that ran bumper to bumper, up and over the wheel wells that held r.e.a.l.l.y. w.i.d.e. mag tires, there was beautiful grill work in the front and dual exhaust in the rear.
I slapped the name Star on my Nova and learned really fast that I’d hit the driving stratosphere. Guys take an extra-long look at young women driving muscle cars. One could argue that my Nova SS didn’t technically fall into the muscle car division, but it sure got a muscular response from the opposite sex.
Looking back at my earliest days of car ownership, I would have to give myself zero points on creativity in the car naming department. I kicked things up a notch or two over the next few decades. I’m putting my 280Z story on hold (there’s a reason) and I’m jumping ahead a bit. As a married woman, I owned a Nissan Stanza named Stanley, a white RAV4 named Stella, and a black RAV 4 named Echo.
When Tim and I stuck as a couple, I started naming his cars, too. There was Babs and Mike — one was a Nissan something or other, and the other was sooooo not worth remembering sooooo I don’t remember it. Tim purchased his cars using one metric — I need a car — I see a car — I can afford the car — I buy the car.
He changed his tune when he saw Honey. The car who became the love of my husband’s life.
Honey was a 1998 Hyundai Sonata GLS sedan, and she was absolutely beautiful — all black and sexy as hell. She had beautiful chrome work on the sides, and a very nice looking Hyundai logo in front. Her frame sat low to the ground, so you didn’t get in the car — you got into the car. Her interior was gorgeous and loaded: tan leather heated seats, power everything, a dashboard that looked like wood grain with dials that lighted soft blue, a really cool sunroof, and a ‘to die for’ stereo system.
The initial problem for Tim when it came to purchasing the Sonata — she was out of our price range. That was the only argument he had for not buying the car he wanted. That pesky pricing issue meant nothing to Sheryll Bodine. My counter-argument: “You fell in love with the car.” The woman who was a bit of a motorhead could have stopped there — I should have been able to stop there, but Tim was practical, purposeful, and thoughtful, so he needed more work.
For the record, I’ve lived my life following the principles of practical, purposeful, and thoughtful — except when it comes to automobiles. In general terms, my purchasing practice comes down to this: you set a price range — you look at cars within that price range — you peek at cars that are slightly above your price range (strictly for shits and giggles). If you fall in love with a car — you wave the white flag of surrender and buy the car. Easy-peasy.
Mr. Wonderful always stayed in his lanes when it came to living his life — particularly when it came to big ticket purchases. So, needless to say, when it came to Honey, Tim needed more of an incentive, so I gave him more “—And you drive over an hour to and from work each way, where you put in long hours, and you should be comfortable on your drive, and you need a new set of wheels, and you never ask for anything, and you should have the car you want.” That little push made Tim O’Brien the proud owner of Honey — the ‘new’ woman in his life.
I had Stanley at the time and found no reason to become part of a lover’s triangle, so I left Tim to his dalliance with Honey and spent my driving time with my Nissan Stanza — a really cool, raised, station wagon thingy with sliding rear doors and oodles of trunk space. The girls and I really loved Stanley, and when all four OBs were doing ‘family time’ we did it in Stanley.
Rarely did I drive Honey, but when I did, I knew why my man was more than a bit smitten. She had it all — beauty, warmth, and a sexy playfulness. On the rare occasion when I’d settle into Honey and pull off our driveway, the surround sound system went on blast, the sunroof slid back and tucked into the roof somewhere, and all four windows went down. Though she was an automatic, I watched and listened to her purrs and revs.
I loved my infrequent times with Honey, so I treated her with the utmost respect.
And. Then. This. Happened.
I bolted upright in bed and read the alarm clock. It was just before 5 AM on a Saturday morning in early December. I padded softly to the bedroom window, moved the shade aside, and felt the bottom fall out of my innards. I quickly padded out of the room and down the stairs, grabbed my winter coat, stuffed my bare feet into my boots, grabbed a set of car keys we left hanging at the front door, and went flying out into the blizzard. I grabbed the shovel that’s always left at the front stoop during winter months, quickly shoveled a path to Honey, key fobbed her open, and took several inches of snow to the front of me.
I started to cry, then started shoveling her out. Yeup – I left the sunroof open the night before.
There was at least 8” inside Tim’s lover. No sexual innuendo intended.
Really.
I’m not sure why I didn’t hear the approach of my growling husband, but he was on scene before I could make a run for it.
“Where are the keys?”
I handed them to him, even though I suspected this was it — he’d had enough and was planning his escape.
Instead, he got into his lover — (okay, that just happened) — turned her on — (okay, that was intended) — touched her in that special way (forget it) — and waited for her to respond. Slowly, ever so slowly, her sunroof slid forward which kept further snow from falling inside (NO, it did not occur to me to do that). Tim got out, took the shovel from me, suggested I leave, then spent the better part of the morning shoveling Honey — from the inside out.
I was banned from Honey.
I totally understood his position — his obsession because I nurtured it in him and because I loved Zelda once upon a time.
Zelda, my Datsun 280Z was gorgeous. She had a long, sleek front end and blunted rear — two prominent features of a 280Z. She was midnight blue with black leather interior, and had black rear window louvers. The dashboard was beautiful — with large, circular, side-by-side speedometer and tachometer displays, and a low-slung cassette/radio all of which lighted to a soft melon color. The 5-speed stick was leather and chrome and was Meant. For. Business. The inside of my 280Z looked like a mini-cockpit, and I loved it.
When it comes to sports cars, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Visual appearance is undoubtedly the most important thing, but there’s so much more to ‘the falling in love experience’ — and when it happens to you — you know it.
If you’ve never heard yourself moan at the sight of something with four wheels — then you’ve never been in love with an automobile. I moaned when I first saw Z. In that instant, things I didn’t even know existed became things that set the yearning and eventually sprung the trap.
I’m sure for some, the falling in love might be inspired by the list of things found under the hood. I used to know stuff about horsepower and torque and redline rpms — huh, that blast from the past was fun. I knew all that stuff and enjoyed ‘talking the talk’ with other Z owners, but I did not buy Z based on what was under the hood, I bought her because of the way she made me feel.
Seeing her was one thing, but my love affair with her was about the sounds she made. The solid thump when the door closed, the awesome whoosh-click sound the blinker made, the gentle drag and slap of the windshield wipers, the sexy purr and guttural moan of the engine when she was up or down shifting. Mmmmm. Every single sound from Z was sexy as hell and I felt sexy as hell — every time I slid into her low bucket seats. Mmmmm.
Driving was mundane before I met Z — it certainly wasn’t an experience. My mother taught me how to drive on her Ford Granada. It was boxy, had an automatic transmission, and was a very popular ‘family car’ of the 1970s. My mother loved her car, and she should have, she worked hard to buy it, and she took great pride in owning it. And, she gets major props for teaching me how to drive.
When it came to learning how to drive a stick — well that came about in a very odd way. In the late 70s, I worked for an executive at Hanover Insurance company. He asked me to house-sit while he and his family were away on vacation. He left his wife’s Pinto for me to use — unfortunately I didn’t know how to use it — and I didn’t know that until after I’d been dropped off in Northborough by a friend.
“A stick shift!” What’s a girl to do? Teach herself how to drive a stick.
It was a very ugly experience — one that left me stranded on a track at a railroad crossing w.a.y. t.o.o. l.o.n.g. for my liking. There was a whole lot of bucking and stalling during that time on the tracks, and I’m quite sure the clutch needed replacing when the vacationers returned from their fun in the sun, but by then, I knew how to drive a manual transmission and I. Was. Hooked.
That experience paved the way for me to purchase manual transmission cars and to date dudes who could drive manual transmission cars. It became a prerequisite, much like my dudes needed to love the Red Sox. I wasn’t a hard ass about things. If a guy asked to buy me a drink, I didn’t counter with questions about cars and baseball, but it didn’t take long for me to suss out the pertinent info. Usually, all it took was a gentlemanly walk of this girl to her car — her 280Z.
Broad smile and impressed nod of the head = he knew how to shift a stick.
No smile and no question = he wasn’t long for my bucket seats.
I absolutely love being a part of the driving experience —— the clutching and shifting and being one with the car. Driving a stick requires active participation, it involves anticipation about what gear you’re in and what gear you’ll need to be in when you get onto or off of a highway, for instance. If I was in fifth on an open stretch of road, and I needed to exit, I’d clutch and put Z into neutral, then figure things out as I needed to. (There’s a reason I’m telling you this — really there is).
Knowing how to drive a manual transmission doesn’t mean you won’t have a bumpy ride.
Initially.
It took no time at all for Z and me to find perfect harmony. No time before I didn’t need to watch her RPMs to know when to clutch and shift. I could hear her subtle call. We were in perfect sync and we remained that way until Hannah was born and my two-seater went from sexy to impactable with one rev of the engine.
I sold Z to Kevin Mullaney shortly after I gave birth to my firstborn. I remember meeting him on the driveway, telling him this and that about the object that had so perfectly objectified me for the ‘footloose and fancy-free’ fun years of my life. I said a silent goodbye to Z, handed off the keys, and went into the house. I just couldn’t watch him drive away in my sexy little dream car.
I’ve been thinking a lot about Z lately. In fact, I had a dream about her not long ago. As soon as I steroided myself up, I started having dreams again. Almost all of them have been lovely. Almost all of them fit nicely into my theory that my life is passing before me in snippets. When I dreamt about Z, I sort of knew it wasn’t just a dream, it held significance — a harbinger of things to come.
A week or so ago, the meaning of Z became clear.
I was readying for a downshift.
I was readying to take a corner onto a new part of my journey.
A little backstep: On November 9, 2021, Tim took me to UMass hospital for the much dreaded bone scan. I met with a very understanding and very patient technician who helped prepare me physically and mentally for an IV push of radioactive material into my veins, and a terrifying trip into a partially enclosed machine.
The results of that scan showed widespread cancer throughout my skeleton. I was put on high alert that the imminent cause of concern was a break of a major bone or the collapse of my spine which would lead to a rather quick demise. Barring that, it might take six months for the cancer to claim me.
For months, I’ve been fearing a bone break — rightfully so. Every time I needed to leave the comfort of my power chair, I said a little prayer then held my breath until I was returned safely to my perch.
The months of October, November and December were a flurry of medical activity and talky-talk. There was sooooo much information being thrown at me and way too many emotions to deal with to really deal with. Dr. Wonderful was with me every step of the way and gave the hard truth compassionately and suffered along with me at the reality of my situation. We have known one another for about fifteen years, so I know I am more than just a patient to him — not only because there’s history with us, but because he is that kind of physician — a thinking and caring physician. It is beyond comforting knowing that my situation is more than professional for him.
At the end of the day, Dr. Wonderful is my PCP, and as such, it was his job to answer my questions as often as I needed. He was a wealth of information, and if he thought he needed to check something out before doling out facts or plans, he said so. I trusted him then — I trust him now — and without his help, I would not have been able to handle this shit fest.
Anyway, the fear of a broken bone has been forefront in my mind since my diagnosis. My fear ratcheted up when I looked at my bone scan results a month or so ago and saw with my own eyes how much cancer is inside of me — and how much deterioration has taken place. I’ve shared the scan images with a handful of people each of whom lost their breath when they first saw the ink black skeleton. Some uttered things like, “Whoa,” or “Oh. My. God.” or “How did you not know?” A couple echoed my sentiments upon seeing the devastation, “Fuck.”
I was sort of pissed with myself when I first looked at the images. It was one thing hearing Dr. Wonderful say I had bone cancer from my skull to my knees, but believe you me — his words took on greater meaning when I saw it for myself.
Bottom line: I am so glad I’ve spent 24/7 on my ass. There have been only four instances when I rose to my feet for purposes other than peeing. 1) when my brother, Don, left my home on Christmas Day. We both knew it would be the last time we’d be together, and we both knew it needed to end with a hug. And it did. 2) when Kathy came to see me before she left for her winter trip to Florida. I needed her hug before she left just in case it was the last time we saw one another — though we promised it wouldn’t be. It won’t be. 3) when Tim and I ended our Date Night. Enough said. 4) when I went to the door the other day to wave to guests who were leaving. The last two instances included a trip to the bathroom, so technically, they were a two-for.
Anyway, back to the downshifting. The physicality of it felt just like my dream of Z — coming off a long stretch of highway where I was coasting along pretty well, a step onto the clutch, a move of the shift into neutral, the steering onto an exit ramp, the pumping of the brakes, the slowing of the car, the slowing of the RPMs, the shifting into a lower gear, the release of the clutch and voila — I’d taken a corner.
The physical manifestation of all of that ended with this realization: I could have a catastrophic break of a bone resulting in a sudden death OR the cancer that is so clearly spreading throughout my body could be the thing that kills me. It certainly has a death-grip on me. Based on the overall level of discomfort (I’m taking 12 Tramadol pills a day now), and the intensity of the stabbing and grabbing, nibbling and gnawing rodent on all parts of my body, and the overall fatigue, and the extra work it takes for me to sit upright and type a blog or read a book or chat with Tim, and the number of naps I take now, is a constant reminder that I am dying of cancer.