Car washes. In a little kid sort of way, I absolutely love them. I might even giggle as I go through one. I usually take the boys to the neighborhood gas station car wash… it takes about two seconds and they look at me wide-eyed as we go through. We wash the six months of dust off the Pathfinder and use up time in the infinite summer day. On Wednesday, as we were getting gas at Costco, I glance over and realize Costco has a car wash. A GIANT car wash. Don’t ask me how I haven’t seen it before now. 7.99 for a GIANT car wash? I can already feel myself giggling. I turn back to the boys “Oh boys!!!! Let’s go through the car wash!” Like most conversations, they look at me like I’m about five apples short of a barrel. The car WAS really dirty and it did need a wash and 7.99 seemed like a really great deal. So away we go. We put the car in neutral and start rolling through. First came the rain. It started raining harder. I glanced in the rearview mirror and Josh looked concerned. Then the soap came and you couldn’t see out of the windows. I chirped positively from the front seat, “Oh, look, now the soap is spraying the car to get the yuckies off.” Their eyes were big and started to fill with tears. Reminded me of Japanese cartoon characters. I prattle on, “OK guys, now the wind is going to come to blow all the water off.” Correction: It was a tornado. A tornado in the middle of the desert inside the Costco car wash. By this time, both boys were wailing and Josh was yelling “I’M SCARED….SCARRRREEEEY!!!!!!!” The “I’m a Terrible Mom” alarm started going off in my head. Me to myself: “Shut up! I had great intentions.” Now I start pleading with the boys, “C’mon guys… hang on, we’re almost through.” I couldn’t even hear them cry anymore over the roar of the dryers. And just like that, we saw daylight and rolled out into the light. The boys sniffed and we were all quiet. Me, berating myself and thinking about how I probably traumatized them and ruined their life. They were probably already thinking about how they were going to con me into giving them another cookie. When we got home, I inspected the car. Yes indeed. That was a quality car wash for a great price. I’ll definitely be going back. But next time, I’ll leave the boys at home. After all, a giggle and a desert tornado is well worth this mom’s price of admission.
An American humorist, writer and author. When boiling down the chicken soup of life, she finds those golden, fried nuggets of truth & writes them long after the kids go to bed.
