Dear Kid,

So there we were. Just east of Buffalo, NY, with a broken ABS and instructions not to shift into park under any circumstances.

On we drove (sans cruise control) until it was time to stop for a driver shift. Dad dropped me off close to the restroom (surprise) and he and the Puppy drove over to the grassy side of the parking lot. Where he put the car in park. Sigh.

We fed the dog, stretched our muscles, and climbed back into the vehicle ready to do battle with the gear shift.

Amazingly, no problem. I shifted right into drive. “Hey, look at that! No dashboard lights! And cruise control works!” I was a happy camper.

On we drove.

Until we hit traffic outside of Cleveland.

We slowed to a crawl. Not a toddler scooting to the other side of room crawl. A really, really slow crawl. Think sleeping snail crawl. DearKidLoveMom.comWe slowed to a crawl. Not a toddler scooting to the other side of room crawl. A really, really slow crawl. Think sleeping snail crawl.

Eventually, and by “eventually” I mean about 6 weeks later, construction ended and we went back to driving at a reasonable speed.

Dad was in the passenger seat, working on his computer, the Puppy was curled up on the backseat pretending he wasn’t napping, and I was driving. When

BAM!!

I gasped.

“WHAT DID YOU DO???!!!” yelled Dad.

“What happened?” said the Puppy.

“I didn’t DO anything,” I snarled.

“What happened?” said the Puppy (again).

A deer had some running from the left and at an angle to headbutt the side of our car. I really, really hope Bambi is ok. That ruminant is going to have one heck of a headache. (Note: Our car is fine. It doesn’t have a headache.)

A mere 10 hours after we’d begun our journey we made it home.

Where I promptly broke a glass dish, because that had to be done and we had nothing to do other than clean it up.

It was a long day. But, like most days, had the decency to end at midnight.

Love, Mom