I've had lots of nightmares in my life...but none quite so funny as the one I had the other night. Yes, you read that right, funny. Laughter is one of those things that always feels good, even in the midst of pain. So I try to acknowledge the funny and ridiculous things in my life and enjoy them for what they are. It feels good to laugh. I guess it might be a stretch to call this a nightmare, but it was a very intense dream at the time.
There are two things that tend to make me crazy in my day to day life: door locks and carseats.
The automatic locks on my car don't work anymore. That wouldn't be a problem except that the car thinks they still work. It won't let me lock the driver's side door manually because that lock is supposed to be connected to the auto-lock system. Back when the system worked, if I pushed that lock it would lock everything, or I could push the auto-lock button to lock everything. Now to convince the doors to lock I have to push down both the lock itself and the auto-lock everything button on the door. But that button only works if the door handle is pulled out. It's a 2-3 hand operation, and one that definitely doesn't work when you're carrying stuff, though I'm getting pretty good at it.
Now to the car seats: The laws have changed in my state, requiring that kids under 8 be in a carseat. Why does this drive me crazy, you might ask? Well, at the camp where I work, we do all of our transportation in vans, not busses. That means that the kids are required to be in car seats. So, if you're working with a group of younger kids, you get the immense pleasure of loading 13 car seats into a 15 passenger van every day. Yeah not fun. They're mostly just the basic booster seats, so they aren't a huge deal except that it makes it so the kids are not able to buckle themselves (squeezing two buckled seat belts in between each booster seat is a challenge. That means that loading a group of kids in a van can take at least 10 minutes, not to mention the time you already spent loading the seats in. Also you do get the kids that bring the full back booster seats, and even some with the 5-point harness that require actual installation rather than just pulling the seat belt through. Honestly, some days dealing with car seats is the hardest part of camp!
Now back to the dream.
I had parked in a parking lot somewhere in the middle of the day. It was outside of somewhere I had gone to get food. The parking lot was nearly empty. As I opened my door I tried to lock it, but the lock wouldn't go. I tried all the tricks I knew, and nothing. I had an armload of something or other that I was carrying in with me, making everything much harder. "Forget it," I finally decided. After all, it was broad daylight in an empty parking lot. I didn't REALLY need to lock the doors.
I went inside and got my food. It took a bit longer than expected and when I came back out I got that feeling of dread in my chest. Sure enough, I looked over at my car and I could see a woman's back as she had opened the backdoor and was rummaging through the back seat area of my car.
"HEY!!" I shouted loudly.
She looked up, fearful. Her image was very similar to that of the cat lady on the Simpsons. She looked crazed, and desperate. She grabbed a giant car seat out of the back of my car and took off running with it. This part is especially funny because this was my personal car. I don't have kids, and I'm pretty sure there has never been a car seat in the back of that car...especially one this huge and decked out. (It looked like what a celebrity might buy for their kid...super plush, all sorts of features...probably nothing like it that exists in the real world).
"You can't have my car seat!" I shouted at her.
"I just need it for my children. They need somewhere to sit. That's all I took! We're desperate!" she shouted, still looking and sounding crazed.
I caught up to her and grabbed on to the other side of the seat.
"It won't work for your kids. It's USED!" I said the word used like it was the deciding answer to every question that has ever been asked. This would've been the moment in the movie where the dramatic music played. This was the big moment.
You see, I had just recently overheard a conversation amongst friends about how you can't buy a carseat used, no matter how much you know about the owner. They said that there is always the possibility that it had been in a wreck or was expired, and you had no way of knowing. I was shocked to hear that car seats don't get passed on to other kids and families, considering how expensive they are and how much material goes in to making them. Apparently the thought has stuck with me.
Apparently the crazy lady in my dream was aware of this fact too as she sadly and dejectedly let go of the seat at this point and handed it back to me. Her demeanor changed from crazy to a bit withdrawn. "You're right," she mumbled quietly, and walked slowly away to what looked like a back alley.
I proudly clutched my deluxe car seat, marched it back to my car, and stuck it back in its place. What child may have been planning to ride in this seat, the world may never know. Even in the dream I remember thinking to myself, "Wait, I have a car seat?" lol But it sure didn't stop me from defending it from the would-be robber, despite how much she looked like a crazy lady.
There's probably all sorts of deeper meaning at play here if you wanted to get in to that, but I'm instead just choosing to find it absolutely hilarious! :)
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