More Adventures

Last week I took my car in for a routine oil change.  I live one block from work, so I rarely drive anywhere and this is something I hadn’t done since, ahem, January.  I was actually only a few miles over the 3000 or whatever it is.  So it wasn’t that big of a deal.

I don’t go to one of those “fast food” style oil change places, because whenever I do they always screw something up and I end up having a $300 repair afterward, so it’s actually much more affordable to just take it to the shop to have the oil changed.  Plus, these days I have my car repaired by Leo’s, and they’re literally next door to the salon.  They are some of the nicest men and women (I know, women mechanics, it’s a cool place.) ever.

When I went in to pay for it, however, they told me my rear brakes were in bad shape.  They were down to 5%.  I had some options.  Then he started speaking Greek (or he might as well have been).  I could have the ones I’ve got “machined” or I could get new ones.  I burst into tears.  These guys know me.  They know my story.  They knew Sawan.  So I felt pretty safe, but it was still humiliating.  So I told him I was going to call my dad and see what he thought and call him later.  The thing is, I used to have to make these decisions by myself when I was single, and I did it (I’m sure what I did was just what I did this time:  call my dad.), and I actually didn’t rely on Sawan for all of the car stuff when we were married.  I took care of almost everything.  He occasionally would take it to have the oil changed but mostly it was my car so I took care of it.  But, when it came to stuff like repairs, he knew what was going on under the hood and I didn’t, so he made the decisions.  This being the first repair was just super hard.  It’s so weird how inanimate things can make you feel emotions. 

Bottom line is, between my sweet dad talking me through the options and translating Greek to English, and the amazing team at Leo’s that put up with the grieving widow, I made a decision, and the new machined breaks worked great on my one block drive home last night.  I did it, all by myself.  Well, without Sawan anyway.

Also this month, I filed our taxes jointly for the last time.  My amazing accountant had done everything for me, so that all I had to do was sign and mail, but when I opened them to the second page, the glaring “deceased” in big black letters was a little hard to stomach.  Thank God I don’t have to do that again.

I would like my parade now.