While getting gas this morning, (I always go to self serve), I heard one of the attendants at full serve yell to a customer, “shut it off!”, meaning the engine.
It took me immediately back to an interesting and difficult time in my life. On an extremely chilly morning much like today, (it’s -46 Celsius/-50.8 Fahreneheit right now with the wind), I was having a very bad start to the day.
It was 2013 and I had been having car troubles. I’d put a new alternator in, of course replaced the battery but it still was giving me problems to start. I’d even had a friend come and change the plug in, thinking maybe it was faulty. I was newly on my own with the kids living in an apartment. Newly separated. Trying not to lose my mind and appear in control and content, for the kids.
I went out in the morning and the car wouldn’t start. I texted a friend/coworker who had a handy husband and he came right over to boost my car. Grateful doesn’t even begin to describe how relieved and happy I was that he came right over on such a frigid morning to help me out.
He got it going and I wanted to let it run as long as possible to charge the battery but I would soon need gas. I dropped the kids at school and drove to the gas station. I just knew that if I shut it off to gas up, it was not going to start again.
So I left the car running and started pumping my gas. Surely one time of breaking this rule wouldn’t cause an explosion and destroy the place or kill someone. But nope, couldn’t get away with it.
The old lady who worked inside had been watching like a hawk. She opened the door and yelled “you need to shut your car off!”, in a not very nice tone either. I pleaded with her, told her the story about my battery being dead and getting a boost just ten minutes prior. I told her plainly if I shut it off it’s not going to start again.
What I really wanted to say to her was: Please have pity on me, I’m going through a separation, funds are tight, I have a stalker (story for another day), I’m stressed beyond belief and on the verge of bawling my eyes out, I’m trying to keep these kids happy, trying not allow this separation to affect them in the slightest (foolish I know), it’s freezing out please have pity on me!!!!
She did not care and insisted I shut the car off. So I did. I put twenty bucks in the car and climbed in to start it, fingers crossed.
It did not start. I don’t know how I didn’t cry to be honest. I texted my friend/coworker and she sent her husband once again to save me and boost my car at the gas station. He arrive within minutes but as he put the hood up, the old hawk inside yelled that he couldn’t boost it right at the pump, again, fire hazard, and so he and I had to push the car about ten feet away from the pumps.
He got it going again in seconds and I think I was only about ten minutes late for work. I left the car running right til lunchtime as I was not taking any chances.
I always brag about being an independent woman but there were times when I was completely on my own that the stress of having no one, was amplified. I guess I survived.
That evening I dropped off a mickey of whiskey for my friend/coworker’s husband, to show my appreciation.
bloom.planted.north 
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