Your Weekly Hoodoo Thread: Mississippi State edition

Whew…now THAT was a football game, y’all.

I knew going into this yearly dust-up with the corndog-eatin’ swamp people of the boot-shaped state that we were in for a tussle. One just doesn’t stroll into Death Valley and walk out with a victory, unmolested. No, generally speaking, if you go into Tiger Stadium expecting to just dominate all up in their Tiger faces, piss on the couch cushions, drink all the beer, and leave…well, you, my friend, are in for a rude awakening.

After three quarters of clinched teeth, balled fists, and hollered curses, our beloved Crimson Tide broke the stalemate and asserted its will. In the meantime, the Bama defense…Good Lord, I just don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like it, my faithful friends. I know, an offensive juggernaut LSU is not. But what Alabama’s D did to them for four quarters would constitute war crimes in some societies. There was no room for Fournette, and Etling was treated as flank steak with the Bama front seven the Mjolnir-like tenderizer.

It wasn’t pretty to some, but it was a thing of beauty to a defensive purist like your humble narrator. And regardless of the relative aesthetics of the approach, it was effective. Our boys are still undefeated and unblemished, despite the best efforts of those teed-off Cajun folk. Hallelujah!

But now, the Tide has the task of avoiding the hangover against an MSU team that is trying to locate its misplaced mojo (I think Dak Prescott took it with him when he left for Dallas…Tony Romo wishes he would have left ‘at shit in Starkvegas). For the most part, State has been a dumpster fire: an offense that has been largely ineffective coupled with a defense that couldn’t stop South Alabama. It seems like the prime setting for an interdivisional ass-whuppin’ (and Vegas concurs, setting the spread at 29 points). But…not so fast. If past history tells us anything, it’s that coming off of a physical cage match with LSU, Bama tends to struggle with a feisty bunch of Bulldogs the following week. It’s not so much what Mississippi State can do, but rather how Alabama responds to a meat-grinder of a game the week before.

Now, that said, we as the faithful must do our part to ensure that our men in crimson avoid this traditional momentum pitfall in the Tide schedule. Not only do we need the Tide to emerge undefeated heading into Cupcake Week, but we need the Tide to remain healthy (and getting Jalen Hurts a little polish in the passing game against the nation’s 102^nd ranked pass defense for the long road ahead wouldn’t hurt, either.) 

Therefore, though you may have cashed your Hoodoo checks in big games of the previous weeks, we must, MUST, appease Loki and keep him satiated, even against a meager opponent such as the Bullpuppies. Loki is nothing if not ravenous, and his appetite for shame is neverending. Therefore, it is your solemn duty as a Hoodoo-ite to come with it now, don’t hold back for the Iron Bowl or beyond. After all, those games are weeks away…plenty of time to create shameful memories anew, if need be.

So this week, I will cast my net back into the Hoodoo history of yours truly, to a shameful near-death experience in my youth that shied me far from the much-desired chariot of freedom most teenage boys of proper age covet: the family car. Such a source of shame for me this tale is that I have forgotten it, lo these many years I’ve been keeping this Hoodoo ledger alive. Buried it deep within me ole consciousness, I did…a scar far too painful to reveal. But a Hoodoo accounting I must make to keep yon championship season alive, and this one most assuredly fits the bill. So alas, on to this dirty business we call the Hoodoo…

Now, let’s step into this here Hoodoo time mo-sheen and set the dial back for the early 1990s, a time of grunge, of flannel, of inordinately long skater-bangs. I was a child of the times: a misfit, albeit one that was in keeping with the trends and tastes of the day.

Ever an anti-authoritarian, I gravitated at an early age into the more alternative lens of viewing life. I fancied myself an artist, a musician, a bastion of the avant garde at my high school. I was a jazz saxophonist, a concert clarinetist (not my Hoodoo), a metal bassist. I journaled daily and wrote poetry. I learned how to make the perfect hollandaise, how to perfectly brown a gumbo roux. I made bread from scratch, but could put a .30-’06 round through a quarter at 200 yards. I could match a shirt and tie combo, or a flannel and concert tee pairing, with equal aplomb. Add into the equation that I was an amateur boxer and part-time collector for the local dope man, and you get an idea of the whole “Renaissance man” vibe I was cultivating to the fullest degree.

That said, I was also a weird kid, and a dumbass. But then again, aren’t we all at that age? In a time before mandated school uniforms, I was constantly draped in a flannel shirt, unbuttoned and a’gape save for the top button (cholo-style), usually with a Jane’s Addiction, Metallica, or Suicidal Tendencies shirt showing through from underneath. When it was cold enough, there was that whole trench coat thing I was doing for a while. Chucks, combat boots, studded belt, chrome lug nut ring…the whole nine yards.

Given my chosen “profession” at the time, I was perceived among my immediate circle of friends as a bit of a badass. I was a big kid, and I kept a couple pairs of sparring gloves at the house for whenever my friends were feeling froggy. I’d let them box me in the backyard, and that rarely ended well for them. Once, I took on three of them at a time, and wiped the floor with the three amigos. Never got that challenge again.

For all this posturing, however, I didn’t usually try to leverage it into any sort of play with the ladies. Of course, like any 16-year-old male, I was feenin’ for that drug that only a sweet young woman of curvaceous form can provide (Tittays…I’m talmbout the tittays.) But there was an awkwardness about the whole dating/ courting thing for me. I’d never had a dad to school me in the finer points of the woo. Of course, I’d heard my friends talk, seen plenty of movies. But I had a certain psychological roadblock going on something fierce. The girls who wanted me, who would have sold their souls to Ole Scratch himself just for a date with ya boy…they didn’t interest me. Like, at all. Wouldn’t give those darlin’s the time of day, threw them over in the friend-bin. In retrospect (‘round about my college years) I realized the previous error of my ways, and fortunately, I was able to correct course before entering the whole mainstream “adulting” thing. However, in high school, I had a habit of chasing the unattainable rather than that which was before me. If a girl ig’ed me, my loins burst into flame for her. If she acted like I didn’t exist, I resolved to do the impossible. I was a fk’d up young’un, y’all.

But alas, such is not my Hoodoo, though it is indeed peripherally related.

Now, as any 15-year-old can tell you, there is nothing more exciting as that 16th birthday approaches than the prospect of a driver’s license. It is the heroin that kids of that age crave after getting a mere taste of the feeling of liberty with a learner’s permit. Freedom is intoxicating in that regard, no? The car, for a teenager, represents more than the simple means of transportation it represents for their more jaded elders. For a teenager, a car IS freedom, a way out, a new identity, the first step toward that nebulous enigma known as adulthood. For a 16-year-old, the first car is the trusty steed one rides out onto the prairie of adulthood to explore and learn. Even if the car is only borrowed for Friday night burger joint romps or weekend trips to the movies with friends, access to a vehicle is probably the most important thing in a rising 16-year-old’s life, something which creates great anticipation for the coming of the sweet 16.

If the car is the chariot to freedom, then surely the driver’s license is the coachman’s whip. Without it, even the most responsible teen driver is going nowhere. The driver’s license test, as you all well remember, is the cause of great consternation and wringing of hands for people of proper age. If you don’t remember how nerve-wracking it truly was, imagine taking the test now, on the spot, as an adult. Scary prospect, no? I could do it, but I’d need my BP meds and a half a Xanax bar to not have an aneurysm.

Such was the case as I ascended to the age of 15-and-a-half. Though I was a master test taker, I was nervous about taking this particular test. This wasn’t something I could study for, per se, but rather combined course work with an executable action. I had already mastered the little ALDOT book that was required to ace the learner’s permit test. That was the easy part. But the next part required something more than that…not only simple mastery of the material, but the ability to put it to use on the road under the glare of a uniformed reviewer.

To stave off the heart-attack-inducing thought of taking a driving test, I did what I’d do for any exam. I studied. In this case, studying meant something completely different, however. To prepare for this test, I’d have to do the unthinkable: I’d have to drive while my mom critiqued my performance. In her car.

A little backstory…by the time I reached the proper age, I had a pretty firm command on the basics of driving, at least to an extent. As my most ardent followers may remember, I was taught to drive in the pastures of Vance, AL in an old one-ton Ford automatic at the age of around 13. Now that kinda drivin’, that there was easy. No curbs to hit, no cars to dodge, no manic fellow drivers to evade…no police. No, that was driving at its most simple, didn’t even have to worry about a clutch or anything…just put it in drive, push the gas, and steer. It was glorified go-kart operation.

But herein lies the rub: my mama’s car, the only car to which I had (or would have) access, was not an automatic. It was a standard shift Chevy Nova.

Of course, as a plebe driver, I had no idea what that actually meant. “Clutch” in-and-of-itself is not a particularly menacing word. I mean, it was just another pedal I had to push, right? I was a musician for cryin’ out loud, I could execute multiple tasks at the same time…no problem.

I remember the first time I sauntered my way into the driver’s seat of that car. Momz and I had gone up to the grocery store a couple blocks from the house. As we walked out to the car and loaded the groceries, Momz held up the twinkling set of keys.

“You wanna drive us home?”

“Well, hellz yes I want to drive us home!” I thought. I gripped the keys, scurried around to the driver’s seat, plopped down, adjusted the seat and checked the angle of the rear view mirror like a responsible driver would. I was all set.

It was literally less than a mile as the crow flies to the house, but the journey involved leaving the parking lot, getting on Moffatt Road (which is known in these parts by the whimsical alias “Bloody 98”), driving three-quarters of a mile, then turning onto our residential street. No big deal, right?

It would have been no big deal, had I any idea how to manipulate a manual transmission. I asked Momz what I should do first, and she plaintively gave me instructions.

“First, you push the clutch down with your left foot, and hold your right foot on the brake. Turn the key and the car will start. Put the car in reverse with the stick. You can take your foot off the brake and put it on the gas. As you slowly press the gas with your right, slowly lift your foot off the clutch with your left. You’ll feel it, the car will start to pull backward gently. It’s really easy, just a matter of timing.”

Sounded easy enough. I was game. I did as instructed, pushed the clutch in, foot on the brake, turned the key and fired the engine. The car growled to life.

“I got this,” I thought. So far, so good.

I made the transition to the gas pedal, and eased it down while easing up off the clutch. At least, I thought I was easing. Suddenly, the car lurched forward a foot and stalled, dead as a hammer but for the dash lights and the air conditioning blower motor.

“It’s okay, takes a little while to get it right. Turn the ignition off, put your foot on the clutch, and try again.”

She was surprisingly patient. You see, my mother was patient by trade: as an elementary school teacher, she kinda had to be. But when it came to us, I guess she just figured since we were smart, we should already know stuff, so her patience burned with a much quicker fuse.

I followed the instructions, and this time, I moved in minute motions so as not to kill the car. This time, I was successful, the car simply rolled back. I was even able to depress the clutch and shift it into first gear and move forward.

“This isn’t so hard after all,” I thought. Promising stuff indeed.

I managed to make it across the parking lot without tearing the transmission of the car of frying the clutch, which was a positive development to say the least. I’d heard horror stories from the more worldly older brothers of my friends, who talked about family cars decimated by poor clutch work, transmissions ripped asunder at 65 mph on the interstate because of a faulty shift. They may have been tall tales, but regardless, I carried with me a healthy fear of the 5-speed I was driving, as I felt if nothing else, that fear would keep me sharp.

As I approached the outlet of the parking lot, where it dumped onto Bloody 98, I rolled to a stop, foot on the clutch just like I was told to do.

“Now, don’t get antsy, just wait on a good break in the traffic, and do the same thing you did in the parking lot.”

I surveyed the flowing current of four-lane traffic. It was afternoon, and the pace was harried, hectic. Cars were dipping and dodging this way and that. Road-ragers were tail-gating, speed demons were speeding. Being new to the whole highway driving thing, I took a moment to try to gauge speeds. In fact, I took several moments…so many moments that the ever-growing line of drivers behind me were becoming impatient with me. Horns began to honk. I could hear shouted cusswords. One car swung out from the line behind me, slipped into the entrance lane next to me, and went around our car, flipping me off in the process.

“Don’t get flustered, just take your time…but you do need to go soon.”

I sensed that Momz’ impatience was growing as well, so I decided to take the plunge into the next available gap in traffic. I could see the top of a tank truck cresting the hill a couple hundred yards away, and figured there was no time like the present.

I eased off the clutch, pressed down the gas. The car began to roll forward. I looked up to notice the truck was much closer than I had anticipated, was moving faster than I had hoped, and I elected to hurry up my process.

Bad idea. The Nova lurched forward…dead as a hammer. I was straddling two lanes of traffic, car dead, not sure what to do.

“GOTDAMMIT OWB, CRANK THE CAR!” Momz was no longer exhibiting the patience of a saint. What her face conveyed to me now was something more akin to the fire of Mephistopheles.

I switched the car back off, and turned the ignition again…only I forgot to press the clutch. I switched the ignition off and tried again. The car cranked. Again, rushed, I mistimed the clutch-gas cadence and the car jumped and cut out again.

The tank truck, and some other cars, were bearing down on me. The bleating horn of the big truck blared out, as if I didn’t know what was happening and had just stumbled unaware out into traffic like a lost puppy. Didn’t he know I was experiencing my very first clutch crisis?

I panicked, plain and simple. Right there in traffic, with tons of 50-mile-per-hour steel bearing down on me, I folded like a metal chair.

“YOU DO IT!” I unbuckled the seatbelt and slithered between the seats to the back. Momz just stared for a moment, shocked. She then resigned herself to the fact that I was done, broken. Of course, the truck and accompanying cars had come to a stop by this time, abruptly as it may have been. Horns were honking, and there were torrents of cuss words. Momz had to endure the indignity of getting out of the passenger side, walking around to the driver’s side, getting in and starting the car. I stayed huddled down in the fetal position in the back seat in hopes that none of my peers had witnessed this unfortunate event.

That incident, that one solitary traffic mishap on a short journey home in the grocery-getter, had ruined me. From that point on, I didn’t give a shit about driving. My dreams were shattered. Didn’t care one lick about ever learning how to drive that devil-chariot of a mechanical contraption my mama had sittin’ under her carport. My 16^th birthday came and went without the fanfare that surrounded such days of demarcation in the lives of my fellow classmates.

For her part, Momz tried to convince me to give it another go.

“Don’t you want to try it again? We can just go to a parking lot where you can practice your timing.”

“Nope. Thanks. Do you think you may be buying an automatic car sometime soon?”

I was flat out “ruint” on the whole manual transmission thing. Wanted nothing to do with it. My friends would take their tests and get access to their cars. They knew I was of age, and would ask why I wasn’t driving. My answers would vary, but it was usually something akin to “well, we only have one car, so there’s no point,” or, “my Momz’ car is too small for me to drive, I don’t fit.”

But these were all excuses to cover up the fear I had of ever having to count on that medieval torture device known as a standard transmission ever again. It was surely conceived as a death trap, some exercise in eugenics designed to weed out the uncoordinated from the population in unsavory fashion. I would be no part to this horrendous crime against humanity, no sir’ee! My stand was a philosophical one…yeah, yeah, a philosophical one. Had nothing to do with me being a pussy about the manual tranny…no, of course not.

So as my friends earned cars and drove themselves to band practice, I endured the shame of being one of the few 16-year-olds who was still dropped off by his mama. My classmates were stylin’ and profilin’ into the school parking lot every morning, while I rode the cotdang cheese wagon with the baby freshmen and sophomores. I didn’t go on a date that wasn’t a double-date, which can make for uncomfortable situations for all parties (to say the least).

I soldiered on in my stubbornness (as I am likely to do) until pert near my 17^th birthday. In that time, I discovered that life wasn’t life without access to a car. It just wasn’t any fun having to be the tag-along, the third wheel. When other kids would break from band practice to hit the “swimmin’ hole,” I either had to beg a ride or ride out the lunch break on campus with my brown bag. It was some fkd up repugnant shit, and eventually, being a man of action, I decided to do something about it.

It also helped that a particularly fetching young woman had caught my eye, though admittedly, she was of a younger class and had not yet gotten her driver’s license, either. Not because of some previous disposition against the art of driving, but simply because she had not reached her 16^th birthday. I began to chat her up, despite her Auburnic inclinations, and soon we were a thing. Well, as much of a thing as two people who have never been on a real date could be.

I resolved that it was the time in my development as a man to put aside the cowering I concealed in my consciousness regarding mastery of that god-forsaken machine. I would not be held in place by the whim of a manually-manipulated metal casing full of gears and cogs, that much was certain. No, I would rage against the restraints imposed by mechanical engineering, I would lash out at the Draconian grip of auto manufacturers who would see me poon-less because I had still not learned to drive a stick. PEOPLE OF THE SUN, RISE UP!

With the prospect of poontang on the line, I found a way to muster myself up and throw down the gauntlet.

“Momz, I think I would like to try to get my license. Can we go practice in the parking lot of the high school?”

She was glad to comply. I honestly think it was worth it to her just to keep from ferrying my lummox ass all over the countryside in pursuit of my extracurriculars. Not to mention, if I was using her car, I’d become the chauffer for B-Rad as well, as he had his own set of extracurriculars he was pursuing (wink-wink.)

After hours and hours of stops and starts, of clutch-timing gone awry and the ensuing stalls, I finally gained confidence in my ability to manipulate the machine. I thought I had it down, got a little cocky with it even, started turning the radio up and dancing as we drove around the parking lot smooth as silk.

Finally, the time came to put my newfound skill to the test…on an actual road. I can honestly say I was terrified at the prospect. Though I had been able to run up to third gear in the long parking lot in front of my high school to test out my clutch-work while actually moving, it wasn’t the same as the pressure-filled crucible of driving in real-time with hazards and enraged drivers and all that typa shit. I was nervous indeed, but I knew that the next step in my evolution as a driver (and the next step towards getting into the pants of the girl I was covetin’) was to get out on the open road and do tha damn thang.

I remember easing up to the end of the school parking lot and taking the right onto the neighborhood street that led out to Howell’s Ferry Road. It was only a two-lane, but it was one upon which a group of friends had been involved in a terrible accident months before. One died, one was paralyzed, two had severe head injuries that rendered them different people. The road was a straight one, but full of trees and blind intersections. Because it was straight, folks flat-out hauled ass. Very dangerous indeed.

I eased to the edge of Howell’s Ferry the way a first-time skydiver approaches the edge before his first leap. I let the engine idle up, clutch depressed, foot on the brake. I looked left then right, then left again. The time to go was upon me. I worked the clutch like a pro, and the car leapt out into the stream of traffic flawlessly. I ran it up quickly through first and second, and on into third. Finally, I reached that Valhalla I’d never before attained…fourth gear. It was smooth sailing, I was travelling a solid 45 mph and it felt marvelous.

With my bolstered confidence, I told Momz I was ready to take the test.

“Great, we’ll go Monday, after I get off work,” she said.

Awesome. I could use the weekend to practice, and be sharp as a tack on Monday afternoon.

The day came. I was convinced I had this thing in the bag, so much so that I had gone ahead and set up a date for that Monday night (who goes on a date on Monday night?) It wasn’t a huge deal, but it was our first real date, just the two of us, under our own power. After band camp, we were heading up to the Burger Master in Eight Mile to get a burger and a shake…with a potential for a little parking possibly in mind as well.

When I told the girlie that I’d be able to drive us that night, she was giddy, ecstatic. Now we could really be boyfriend and girlfriend, a couple, an item…we didn’t call it “goin’ steady” like you old-timers. But that’s kinda what it was.

Not to mention, after such a long tenure in the non-driving wilderness amongst my peers, I talked a blue streak to my buddies about what I was gonna do when I had my license, how I was gonna save up and buy a cherry red ’65 Mustang and fix it up, how I was a damn manual-transmission ace who would finally be toting them around instead of vice versa. It had been such a long time in coming, and I wanted everyone to know I’d finally be mobile. Like a damn man (albeit a man borrowing his mother’s 4-cylinder).

Monday afternoon arrived and I was all set. We walked into the driver’s license office on Demetropolis Road, the steely resolve of a 17-year-old driver gleaming in mine eye. I filled out the paperwork, paid my fee, and sat in a plastic-bottomed chair for what seemed like an eternity. The place was teeming with slate-gray polyester-clad ALDOT employees, state trooper lookin’ types, only more doughy and desk-jockeyish. Whomever designed the unis for these poor folks didn’t have much of an eye for the feminine form for certain, as gray service trousers and uniform shirts simply don’t do much to complement anyone but barrel-bellied, crew-cut middle-aged men. These were about the most unappealing looking office fraus I had ever laid my eyes upon.

After a few moments, my number was called. I reported to the back door, where an older, bigger-framed cat stood waiting for me, her glasses perched on the tip of her nose, her coif a tightly-curled weave of brownish-gold timbre.

“You OWB?” she asked, reading from a clipboard as I approached. She was a smoker…one could tell by the lizard-growl deep-throated grit that poured out of her vocal hole.

“Yes ma’am, I am.”

“What in hell kinda name is OWB anyway?” she inquired, not jokingly. (While OWB is of course my pseudonym, she said this about my given name, which at the time was unusual, granted, but com’on…)

“I ain’t never heard that name before…yo parents foreign or somethin’?”

Hmmm, was I being profiled? Unsure of how to answer, I decided to go with honesty.

“No ma’am, they’re both ‘Merican, born and raised,” I answered in as perky a manner as I could muster.

“It don’t matter, you probably gonna fail anyway.”

Well, that was certainly a ray of sunshine, no? I could already see that this lady was meaner than a hungry rattlesnake comin’ out of hibernation. This was a revolting development, indeed.

We walked to my chariot, the ’85 Chevy Nova.

“This yours?” she pointed with the eraser of her pencil at my car.

“Yes ma’am…I mean, it’s actually my mama’s, but it’s the car I’m drivin’ for the test.”

“Well, which is it, boy? Yours or your mama’s? Don’t pay to lie to a state official, I’ll tell you ‘at right now!”

This was going nowhere fast.

“It’s my mama’s car, I’m just driving it today.”

“There…was that so hard? Wasn’t a difficult question. Good Lord, help us when you people are runnin’ this country…hope I’m dead by then.”

This woman was a breath of fresh air…a breath of fresh, sulphur dioxide-laden, homicidal air. Someone had most certainly pissed in her Corn Flakes that morning…or on every morning since she was a child. I really couldn’t imagine that this was going to end positively, and where previously I was fearless and confident, I now began to feel the fingers of doubt creeping around my throat.

“Get in there and turn your lights on…pump the brakes…” I could see in the rear view that she was writing something on her clipboard.

“Is something wrong?” I asked.

“Aside from me havin’ to put up with pissant teenagers every dang day of my life, and puttin’ my ever-lovin’ life in jeopardy lettin’ you knuckle-heads drive me around, yes, there is somethin’ wrong. You got a reverse light out.”

She revealed to me that despite that burnt bulb, she could still give me the test. Yippee.

We got into the car, and she immediately filled the cab with the stagnant smell of stale cigarette smoke that had so permeated the polyester of her uniform that it was impossible to cleanse. It was kinda nauseating, especially combined with the smell of old lady herself.

“Turn the car on…you think you can do that?” she said with sarcasm.

“Yes ma’am.” I fired up the Nova, and let it idle while I awaited further commands.

“Aight, go ‘head and pull forward to that yella line up there,” she said. I did as told, smooth like a hot knife through butter, easy like Sunday morning. I could do this, she-curmudgeon be damned.

“Now, you goan pull out on the service road there, and head north.” I could handle that, little traffic on the service road, no problem. I did as commanded, and all was well.

“When you get to the stop sign up there, you goan’ take a right onto Demetropolis.”

Didn’t sound too hard. The rub, however, was that the access to Demetropolis was a bit of a little hill. If you drive a stick, you know that hills can present a bit of an obstacle to a smooth transition. My palms started sweating. I had not practiced a lot of hill-starting. I glanced over towards the old woman, who was side-eyeing me impatiently. I knew I needed to take action, but I sure as hell didn’t want to jump-stall my ass out into four-lane traffic. I said a little prayer, and offered myself encouragement…”you got this, playa.”

However, cool as Cool Hand Luke, I nailed it, worked that leverage between the clutch and gas and rolled that Nova up out into traffic, purty as you please.

I was proud of myself, the worm had turned.  Old lady seemed impressed that I had pulled it off seamlessly.

“Turn left up here, into that neighborhood.” I did, followed her instructions, kept my speed steady and my turns smooth. We came to the true test of the course, an obstacle that stumped generations of prospective drivers in this neck of the woods. You see, on one of the neighborhood streets, there’s a water oak tree rising right up out of the middle of the road. One lane goes left around it, the other goes right around it. For a seasoned driver, it’s probably no biggie. But for a newb, it creates an unfamiliar situation, it creates doubt, it creates hesitation. Wrong decision and your toast, the test ends there.

But it was nothing to me, I chose wisely and sailed past without a second thought. I had this test nailed. It would be worth the extra wait to turn in a perfect score, would give me bragging rights over my buddies who scraped through by the skin of their teeth.

I made my way out of the ‘hood as instructed.

“Okay, turn left across the traffic onto Demetropolis, and head back to the office.”

IT WAS OVER! I was thrilled, I had done it, and had even had to brave this Gorgon of an ALDOT evaluator in the process. Certainly, I was Jason of Argonaut fame, and would regale my compadres with tales of bravery and excellence later while leaning against the hood of my (Momz) car, collar popped.

As I say daydreaming about the stories I would tell, I lost track of the traffic. More importantly, I lost track of the amount of time I was sitting at the stop sign, waiting to pull into traffic. That daydream was shattered by the coarse, gravelly nagging of one gray-clad harpy in the seat next to me.

“WELL WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR? DID YOU DOZE OFF?...GO!” She was displeased, to say the least.

“But I was waiting for…”

“YOU WAITED TOO LONG, WHAT’S WRONG WITH YOU? YOU HIGH? DID YOU DO A MARIJUANA BEFORE THE TEST? S’WAT’S WRONG WITH ALL YOU PEOPLE, YOU ALL HIGH!”

Why was this woman yelling at me? After all, my performance had been flawless to date, she had no reason for this sudden explosive barrage of unfounded accusations. I had been, truthfully, lost for the moment in reverie, though I proclaimed that I was just being extra careful. Why was she so angry?

“YOU’RE STILL SITTING HERE…WELL GO…GO…GOOOO!!!”

Her shouting flustered me. I lost my composure. Under the passel of harsh words from this wicked witch of the DOT, I was unable to focus. I tried to heed her commands and execute the task, but my timing…it was all off. She was comin’ at me all wrong, you see, using the wrong tone. It wasn’t good…not good at all. With a break in the traffic coming, I tried to execute the clutch timing that had given me so much confidence before.

But…I failed. The Nova lurched out into Demetropolis Road, stalled and died.

I couldn’t believe it. Was this really happening? I can’t even tell you what the witch said after that, but it was loud, and unpleasant. I got the car to crank, finished crossing the four-lane, and made my way back to the office.

Always the optimist, as I pulled the car into a space and turned it off, I felt compelled to ask Maleficent my score.

“Your score? YOUR SCORE? God, you are dumb as a stump. Your score is F…AS IN FAIL!”

I guess I knew that was coming, but had hoped that one small error…okay, one big error…would not overrule my previously stellar performance. However, it did, and I was charged with the shame of being a first-time driver’s license test flunkee.

Momz came to the car, expecting to see me jubilant. Instead, I just shook my head.

Of course, the whole ordeal was embarrassing, but the most embarrassing thing was the aftermath. Not only did I have to explain to my buddies why I was not yet among the driving members of our circle, but I had to cancel my long-awaited date. It was one of the most miserable days of my life up until that point, and my heavy bag felt my pain for the next week until I took the test again and passed with flying colors.

So there you have it Loki, you ravenous sumbitch. Please take my sacrifice and swallow it down. If it wins your favor and buoys our boys to victory, then it will certainly be worth it. Roll Tide.