Our muddy driveway made me remember this . . .
(General Disclaimer: Memoirs are a protected freedom of speech under law and therefore allow no grounds for sueing.)
Late October, 2013
The rain came. October and early November are always cold and rainy in Michigan, and this year was no different. Unfortunately, we had not given a thought about our driveway. It was a basic two-track driveway that curved an 800 foot C-shape from the road. Erik struggled one rainy day to make it down the driveway to go to work and called it quits. No more driveway this year – we’d have to park by the road where the driveway was much more solid and not so muddy and walk up or risk getting stuck in the softer areas for good.
I didn’t like this idea. How would I get groceries up to the house?! Carry them all?
Apparently so.
The first week of parking at the street I carried Earen up to the camper and put him in his play gym, then began trudging the 800 feet back and forth staggering toward the camper with armloads of groceries through the front hay field. The hay field was a shorter distance than the driveway, and much less soggy. Typically it took me 8 trips to the car and 8 trips back. Erik didn’t understand why I complained so much about having to park there. It wasn’t that far to walk and exercise is good he claimed. However, he didn’t understand how exhausting it was carrying loads up groceries UP a hill . . . 8 times!
After 2 weeks of carrying groceries up the hill, I finally got smarter. I brought a sled along in the car with me. I’d load the groceries into the sled and pull it up the hill. Sometimes they’d fall out, but usually they did well. I still had to make several trips, but it was a bit easier now.
On one such day, it had rained pretty heavily, making sled pulling quite difficult thanks to the mud. While the hay field was full of 3 inch high grass, it was thin so there were plenty of muddy spots. I heaved my weight into pulling the sled, trying to inch it up the hill. One of the neighbors drove past slowly. I had Earen in my arm and the sled line in my other hand.
The kids also struggled with the mud. The girls were all high into fashion, and wanted to wear all sorts of fancy shoes – some with heels! Despite my constant prodding, they had to find out the hard way that they needed to wear their muck boots to the bus stop. No one liked the thought of wearing those horrid things on a bus full of kids, but I figured out they could simply leave them at the edge of the driveway and change into their school shoes on the drier ground. Problem solved.
Guests were not as fortunate. All of our neighbors knew we parked by the road, and they could clearly see our driveway was hell. Invited guests were warned over the phone. Randy however, refused to walk-up the driveway and simply chose drier days to visit on and drove his truck right through our hayfield (much to my horror).
But not the door to door salesmen.
Surprisingly they do still exist, and these guys were selling the Kirby vacuum. It was a group of misfits inside a van that was so old it threatened to collapse at the sight of our long driveway. The group’s manager was driving – a well-dressed black man with a warm, genuine smile. His assistants looked like they’d been scraped up from the side of the road. One kid barely looked 18 and appeared to not have had a shower in a week or more, his hair was greasy and stuck up in odd directions. The girl, I guess it was a girl, but maybe it was another boy . . . I couldn’t tell . . . she/he seemed a bit more put together than the boy but still struggled to present as polished of an appearance as the manager. One of the two other fledglings looked like a computer geek and the last appeared to be of Asian descent and while he was the best groomed, he seemed lost in the world of adulthood, wondering how he’d managed to get swept-up in this whole salesmen job.
This group of unlucky souls decided to solicit my house. Er, camper. (Not sure what I’d do with a vacuum like that in the camper . . . I already had to keep my tiny shark vacuum in the round top until I was ready to use it.) Unfortunately for them, they didn’t realize how bad our driveway was and decided to give it a go. They didn’t make it very far of course and got stuck . . . directly in front of Larry’s front slider door.
I happened to see the van from the camper’s window and was praying it would not attempt to drive up the sludge-hole that the driveway was today, thanks the freeze and warm cycle of fall weather. I held my breath and watched as the van drove backwards up the driveway then crawled to a stop, buried in the sticky clay.
I ran outside to meet them and see who the unfortunate individuals were. The manager sheepishly climbed out of the trapped vehicle to shake my hand and explain that the van had slid into a big rut and gotten stuck. I tried helping them push it forwards, but it was caught too deep in the rut to gain traction.
I watched with disgust as Larry drove his truck back and forth down the road, driving by SLOWLY and watching it all. The manager flagged Larry down on one of his drive-bys and asked for help. Larry of course insisted that he was too old and would be of no help but he was looking for his friend who also had a truck (yeah right). But it gave me an idea. I told the guys to hold tight as I had something that might help. I ran to the round top and grabbed a few ratchet straps and then ran back. Thankfully Erik had left me the Journey that day (he wanted me to take it to get the oil changed), and it was still parked by the edge of the street. I backed up carefully until I was 10 feet from the front of their van. I took out the ratchet straps and used both to attach to the hitch on the back of the journey and the sales assistants took the other end and attached it to the front of their van (apparently this happened so often they decided to put a hitch on the front for times like this).
Just then, Larry popped out of his slider door and began yelling.
“Ya’ll don’t have any right to be stuck there! That’s not a driveway!”
The manager looked over dejectedly and walked closer to Larry who had sauntered out of his house and stood with arms folded looking at the van.
“I’m sorry sir! It was an honest mistake. We should not have attempted to drive-up this nice lady’s driveway.” The manager offered his hand in apology.
Larry ignored his hand. “Driveway?!” He shouted. “That ain’t no fucking driveway! That’s a racetrack.”
“My apologies sir! It appeared to be a driveway. But I’ll ask you kindly not to use such language in front of this nice lady here.”
By now I tiptoed a bit closer to hear the conversation, hiding behind the van. The other sales people had stopped and stood staring at the face-off as well.
“Lady? Lady?! Let me tell YOU something! That ain’t no lady and this here ain’t no driveway! I called the township and they said the driveway MUST be 50 feet from the property line! This here is only 2 feet!”
You could actually see veins bulging in his neck, and he appeared to be swaying slightly. While I wasn’t sure about the township ordinances regarding driveways, I did know that the county had already inspected it and said it was fine. Despite Larry’s rude remarks, I knew enough that he was just an asshole (pardon the language) and it had nothing to do with me personally.
I popped-up from behind the van and jumped into the conversation.
“I’m sorry about all this chaos in front of your house. These people had no idea how bad the driveway was and it was an honest mistake. As far as the driveway goes, the county already came out and inspected the driveway and said it was good. That’s how we got our mailbox. They told us we were all set.” I replied calmly, trying to smooth things over.
“Fuck the county! They don’t know shit! It only matters what the townships says, and the township says 50 feet!”
The manager stepped forward. “Sir! I’ll kindly ask you again NOT to curse in front of this nice lady here!”
I tried again. “I hadn’t heard anything about township regulations, but I’ll be sure to double-check tomorrow just to be sure. We certainly don’t want to be in violation of any codes, especially with our driveway.”
“THAT AIN’T NO FUCKING DRIVEWAY, IT’S A RACE TRACK, AND YOU CAN’T DRIVE YOUR FUCKIN CAR DOWN IT NO MORE!” Larry staggered out of his house further and was now just a foot from the driveway.
The manager stepped forward and gently pushed me behind him. “SIR. THIS IS THE LAST TIME I’M GOING TO ASK YOU. GO BACK INSIDE YOUR HOUSE UNTIL YOU CAN LEARN SOME MANNERS.” He growled with a fierce gaze.
Larry glanced down at the man’s tightening fist, spit in the man’s face, cursed again and walked back into his house.
The manager gave a quick motion to me to get going, so I jumped into my car and the boy into the van then with the manager and guy/girl pushing I managed to pull the van free in a few seconds. Solidly parked by the road, the manager thanked me. I felt bad about the rough day he was having but thanked him kindly for being a gentleman.
The man shook his head sadly. “The world needs more gentleman, and less assholes like that. Excuse my coarse language. Men like that drink piss for breakfast! I don’t suppose you’d be interested in a vacuum?”
I laughed. “Maybe if I had a house! I am living in a camper right now until we can build one.”
“Kids?”
“5, and one is just a baby.”
He shook my hand again and kissed it, “God bless you ma’am. You have a wonderful heart!”
I walked slowly back to the camper through the hay field, then realizing that Earen was still inside by himself I began to run across the field then jumped inside the camper. Earen looked at me in surprise. He was busy playing with the toys on his stand and play gym. Thank heavens.