Last Wednesday I was in a car accident. I wasn’t hurt and Celeste wasn’t in the car. But, two of my airbags deployed, the rear axle and the frame was bent and, after lots of number crunching, the insurance company decded to total the vehicle.
So I got a rental car that day. Two days later, C and I stopped at the body shop to get my stuff out of the car before releasing it. It’s moments like these that I am so happy that Celeste is such a good kid, because I don’t know what I’d have done otherwise. She sat and played quietly in the back of the broken car while I quickly pulled all of our stuff out of it. Then we headed home to pack a bag and then head to my mom’s house.
My mom and sister offered to watch Celeste on Saturday so I could go car shopping. Without thier help I don’t know what I would have done. Car buying is not easy. And even less easy with an antsy 2 year old.
9 hours later, I was a Subaru Outback owner. More on that later. My brother-in-law saved my ass that day too. First, he came up to the dealership to help me make sure I asked all the important questions. Then, he went way out of his way to help me return my rental car so that I wouldn’t be an hour away from home with a kid and 2 cars. Once again, I don’t know what I would have done had he not offered to help.
So, thanks to my Mom, my sister, and my brother-in-law, I managed to take care of something that would have been all but impossible to do on my own.
I missed Celeste more that Saturday than I usually do. When her mom has her, I guess I’ve learned to somewhat tune that out, because there’s nothing I can do to change it. But with my daughter just around the corner at my mom’s house, on one of the longest and best days of all — Saturday — it was so hard to not just run away from the stuff that needed to be done so I could go spend the day with her. If I hadn’t, though, my only other opportunity would have been the Tuesday after Thanksgiving and I didn’t know how long I’d be able to keep the rental.
So, all in all, I am grateful for my family today, and grateful that I wrapped this mess up as quickly as possible so we can get back to normal life, whatever that is.