New Car

Getting what you want. How hard is that? Sometimes not so hard, if what you want is a cup of coffee. Knowing what you want? I think this is the tricky part for many of us. We are born into a life that we have no control over, except in our brain, the part of us that screams at our caregiver as soon as we can, “You’re not the boss of me.” This we know, that somewhere, deep inside, we are actually our own boss. Some people grow into this, their autonomy is nurtured, and applauded, and they learn to take steps to take good care of themselves. For others, this child's autonomy, this personal power, is a threat to their parents or caregivers, something to be squashed. My mom, for example, when I was pretty little, would actually tell me about my older siblings getting into trouble and how she punished them, and then she’d say something horrible like, “I wasn’t about to let those little shits get the best of me.”

When I was a kid this sounded bad and scary, and it still does now, and I wonder, should I even share this? But there it is, and it’s the truth. Just recently, at 85, my mom shared with me that her mom would beat all of her children with a strap, that way, if she didn’t know who was the culprit of what ever small thing a child might have done wrong, she would have at least whipped the guilty party. What does this do to the child’s autonomy, the child’s right to keep themselves safe? What does it do to their sense of caring for their sibs? Their small sense of self feels the sting, and carries this pain with them, maybe for a lifetime. Maybe then, whipping their own children. My mom went on to tell, that her youngest sister, intent on keeping herself safe, hid the strap down the drain in the basement, where their dad found it, when the sinks wouldn’t drain. I imagine, she simply got the strap, again. I wonder, how all this beating of children got started, was deemed, OK?

What’s this got to do with getting a new car? Well, really all of life is interconnected, we try to chop it up into different parts, work, school, at school, different disciplines, you get the drift. For those of us who think integrally, this can be very confusing, we have to learn to un-connect all the connections we see, to survive in some way. To get the ‘right’ answer, when we continually see, there is no one right answer. That the truth is in the interwoven-ness of all of life. But the ones who think there is only one right answer are often the ones with the strap.

Because of the circumstances in which I was born, and grew up, I didn’t think I could ever really get what I wanted, and so I was taught to be happy with what I got; even if I was unhappy. Being happy was a value, and even this, I could see and accept, what with so much beatings and unhappiness all around. I was fortunate in many ways, and happy to be alive, especially when I wasn’t being oppressed in my family. I loved the sky, the clouds, the lakes that I grew up surrounded by. I grew up with lots of music, since most of my sibs were teenagers when I was young, and there were the band concerts from Lake Harriet that would waft through the summer night’s air.

Sometimes, my dad would take us younger kids in the station wagon and park in the Lake Harriet parking lot to hear the band concert. He’d buy us popcorn, as we waited in the car, jammies on. Life could be good, and if you wanted a box of hot buttered popcorn, you got what you wanted. Every so often, like magic, your wish would come true.

A few years ago, I needed a new car. My old car was paid for, but costing me lots of money in repairs. I didn’t even know who to trust about it’s worth, or if I should continue to fix it. So, I traded it in for a newer car, sight unseen, that my brother-in-law drove down from up North. It didn’t take me long to know I didn’t like this car, but I’d bought it, and I was uncertain as to how to proceed. I was working full-time and in grad school, and I just wasn’t in any sort of place to take the time to think about what I wanted or didn’t want in a car. So, I did nothing, and kept the car, unhappy, but not knowing how to resolve it.

I kept trying to tell myself, it was ok, I was lucky to have a car, and a newer car, but really, I didn’t like the car. It didn’t handle well for me, and it was not a good fit for me to comfortably drive. I wanted a new car. I didn’t know how or if I could afford one, but the day came, just last week. My car needed work again, while I was still making payments, and I mentioned in the service garage how frustrated I was. Well, they hooked me up with a salesperson, and instead of putting more money into a car I didn’t like, I started over, putting money into a brand new leased car. A car that I like. It resonates with the person who is the boss of me, inside of me. The person who knows what I like and don’t like, but just gets lost in figuring out what is acceptable to like, what is ok to want to go after, in a world where getting exactly what one wants out of life seems, well, unthinkable. Because, well, you should just be happy to not be being beaten.