Full disclosure: we never called the van 'Rusty'. Creative license.
Margaret Kay
English/Herrick/9:30-10:45
Descriptive Essay
It was a big van. Not one of those 15 seaters that requires a
special license to drive, but one big enough to make mini-van drivers feel
minute and inferior. Its bench seats could hold all seven of us plus one lucky
friend that, not knowing what they were getting into, willingly came
along. We affectionately named it
“Rusty” partly because of its burnt orange paint but mainly because of the many
patches of brown rust that resided on its exterior. The morning of the
semi-annual Seaside, Oregon trip I would hurry down the driveway, slide open
Rusty’s thick, dented, and recently “keyed” door, and claim my spot by the
window.
It was the same routine every time.
After about 73 minutes of loading the back with duffle bag after duffle bag
plus around five of our bikes we squeezed into the van. The seatbelts were a
salmon color and about an inch think. They were so ancient and heavy that we
had taken to calling them “safety harnesses”. I clicked the dense, shiny metal
parts together and tightly squeezed the belt across my lap. Only when all eight
clicks had sounded, could we begin our journey. My mom was the driver and the
rest of us were the backseat drivers, turning our heads and cringing nervously
every time Rusty came within inches of crushing a Honda civic or taking out a
parking meter. Once we reached the freeway, though we breathed easier knowing
there were less objects to run into. It was also when I first became bored.
Yes, the drive had only lasted fifteen minutes but my attention span at age six
was about as long as the lifespan of our countless pet goldfish. I stared out
the window, but the trees were bent and the cars were smudged blurs of color
which made my stomach hurt so I confined my eyeballs to the van’s interior.
The seats were a blue and orange
plaid with little balls of fuzz all over them. I picked them up and made a
cotton ball sized clump. Placing the bundle of fluff in between my pointer
finger and my thumb I pinched it, clamping down, releasing and repeating. While
performing this customary road trip ritual with my right hand, I reached my
left hand into the pouch located on the back of the seat in front of me. The
pocket was a limitless ravine stuffed to a point far beyond dysfunction.
Crammed with Babysitters club books, baseball cards, brain quests, and half-eaten
lollypops covered with lent and hair, only the brave and severely bored
bothered to reach into the swarming pit. My fingers collided with a bendable
item wrapped in plastic and about the length of a pencil. Childish hope drew me
to conclude it was a half eaten laffy taffy rope, still partially wrapped and
simply forgotten by its previous owner. With a firm tug I pulled it out and to
my dismay it was not at all what I’d dreamed it would be. In my hand there lay
a string cheese spotted with mold and stamped with “Best by December 19th”.
I wasn’t sure of the day’s actual date, but I knew that Christmas had been
months ago and the cheese was probably no longer eatable. Disappointed
immensely, my gaze meandered toward Rusty’s cloth ceiling. It was off white and
the way it drooped reminded me of our tent after a night of camping in the
rain. What amazed me most, though, were the amebic brown splotches covering the
ceiling’s fabric. Automatically I assumed they were coffee stains caused by
lidless mugs full of Starbucks and their simultaneous encounter with a speed
bump. Well picturing this fantastic image the car came to a halt and through
the air my fuzz ball soared, nestling lightly atop the navy blue carpet and
just out of my reach. The clump of lent was joined by other tiny items of
clutter , blanketing the van’s floor. There were grimy, greenish pennies, various
hair rubber bands and scrunchies, a New Kids on the Block cassette tape, three
cue tips, a baby blue, sparkly toothbrush still in its wrapping, around six
guitar picks and many other things that had found their way from someone’s jeans
pocket to Rusty’s floor. My sister nudged me and said “Come on!” The van had
stopped and the misty smell of ocean clung to my nostrils.
I gathered my walkman, pillow and
water bottle in my arms and took the lengthy jump from the van’s edge to the
cracked asphalt of the cabin’s driveway. My legs had forgotten their purpose so
I flexed them firmly. A satisfying ache jolted through my calf and up into my
thigh. I felt my muscles awaken as the elevator of sensation ascended through
them. At the deafening slam of the sliding door we walked away from our home of
four and a half hours and headed toward the cabin. I glanced back at the
beastly machine which was looking pudgy in the Cabin’s narrow driveway. There
Rusty would sit for the remainder of our vacation waiting loyally for the
return trip home.
Guten nacht,
Margaret
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