Reverse Psychology

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Wednesday - December 19, 2007

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I never thought I would say this, but it may be time for me to relinquish my 1995 black Dodge Ram truck. Oh, it still runs like a Swiss watch and it still looks pretty good after it’s washed and waxed. So why do I want to get rid of it? Because the driver’s side window can no longer be rolled down.

That’s a bigger deal than you can imagine. At first, I didn’t think much about it because the air conditioner still works really well. But after driving it for a few days with a window that can’t open, you find that this inconvenience far outweighs the value of the truck.

The day after I discovered the broken window mechanism, I drove the truck to work. I had a meeting at our administrative offices in town and had to park in the building parking structure. I forgot about the window so I drove up real close to the parking ticket dispenser.

Unable to roll down my window, I had to find an alternative way to get the ticket. I couldn’t open my door as I was too close to the dispenser. I couldn’t go forward because of the gate and there was a car right behind waiting for me to go in so I couldn’t reverse.

I threw my truck in park, exited out the passenger side door, walked around to the ticket dispenser and got my parking ticket. When I left, I had to do the same thing. The funny thing is, for the next few days, I kept forgetting that the window was broken.

Much of my life is spent at drive-through windows, so this situation was causing havoc with me, both physically and mentally. The closest thing I can compare it to is like losing the remote control for your TV. The week of the storm we had lost power, so I decided to brave the weather and go get some food and coffee from a fast food drive-through.

It was storming rain as I approached the drive-through lane. I then remembered that my window wasn’t working and I cursed out loud because I wasn’t about to get out of my truck and get soaked to run inside. Suddenly an idea struck me and I rolled down the passenger-side window.

I think the fast food worker at the drive-through window was surprised when I pulled up with my truck reversed and paid her from my passenger window. I made like everything was normal and said, “I’m from Japan.”