White Truck, Open Field

It was a white farm truck, maybe a 70's model, standard in the floor. My uncle had been teaching me to drive. It was the summer between 8th and 9th grades and I had gone to spend the season with my grandmother.

Her home was in the same large yard as my uncle and aunt's home. It had a lot of grandmotherly touches. The front porch was filled with flowers, and once a week the Schwan's man came by and filled the freezer out front with delicious processed foods.

My uncle and aunt, the parents of 5, almost had no more children living in the house. The youngest had left us all too early, all too young, and the next youngest was a senior. Her prom dress was jade green, and the man she wore it for is still her husband today.

The family story is he taught my mom to drive, and he would teach me and later my younger brother. It would turn out that my weak arms didn't have the strength to pull that old truck out of gear, so he'd reach over with his left hand and place it on top of mine when it was time to shift gears. My aunt tells a story that my grandmother laughed to see me driving over the hay field, engine grinding in too low a gear for my speed.

And that's how I learned to drive.