Here and Now

Here recently, Scarlett has been giving me some issues.

If you’ve been following for a while, you know I’ve been plagued with bad luck vehicles. Scarlett has ended that cycle, and it’s been a mostly peaceful three years with her. Some tire replacements and standard oil changes, a couple other little things.  But nothing that has rendered her undriveable for more than 24 hours or so. I think I had to have a rental overnight one time because something with her heat broke.  That’s it though.  Nothing crazy.  Nothing unfigureoutable, like was so often the case with the vehicles I had up until I got Scarlett.

In October 2017 I wrote the post  ”Clarice Lives!” Clarice was the vehicle I owned before Scarlett, and she had it out for me. I felt like every time I turned around she was broke down. When I wrote the post, she had left me stranded once again – and I was completely over it.  In the post I wrote the following:

Day 4 without a car. I was feeling it in my soul. I was beating myself up for not having my shit together enough to either have a reliable vehicle or have the means to just stick it in a shop. Here I am, in my 30s, bumming rides from my coworkers to get my kid to school. It was like a bad flashback to my early twenties. So, I am going to vow to you all now. This time next year I am going to have my shit together well enough and have the means to have one or the other. Come hell or high water.

In early summer Scarlett broke down for the first time with a major repair.  She wasn’t just a little broken, but actually in need of a mechanic and a few hundred dollars.  Unlike the days with Clarice though, I had the money to repair her – and I wasn’t stranded, either.  Even if I hadn’t had the kindness of a friend who let me borrow a vehicle, I could have afforded a rental.

It still isn’t a good thing for me mentally though. When the dealership I had Scarlett towed to told me it may be close to a week when I could have her back, I was distraught. I had a vehicle to get me from point A to point B in the meantime, but it wasn’t my vehicle.  It wasn’t my stereo, and it didn’t have the faint smell of flowers and citrus from my homemade air freshener and it didn’t have my black tourmaline crystal hanging from the review mirror. And I mean, I had an idea what was broke on Scarlett, but until they diagnosed her officially, I wouldn’t know if that was all that was wrong with her, or if there was something more. 

I don’t do uncertainty well.  And I really don’t do not having my own vehicle well. 

So, I was a mess. I momentarily forgot everything that I’ve learned over the last several months and let anxiety take over.  I let my anxiety about Scarlett pour into other aspects of my life and everything looked horrible and negative to me.  When really, everything was fine. I just was driving a vehicle other than my own.

I guess it just throws me back to harder, uglier times in my life.  I was conditioned to the fact that if my car was broke it meant a whole slew of other problems.  It never ended with just the car being broke down – a broken down vehicle effected my home life, my ability to work. . . etc., etc.

I mean, I did what I said I was going to do. I have the means to just stick my vehicle in a shop, and if she was real broken, I also have the means to get another decent vehicle.

I guess it’s just hard to forget all those bad feelings associated with a broken vehicle.

Anyway, so I let the old feelings take over and I let the anxiety take over and seep into every other aspect of my life.  Just this side of a panic attack yesterday evening, I stopped. I recognized what I as doing, I recognized that the past problems were not the current problems and I made myself create space between how I was feeling and the current moment.  I showered and I meditated, and I remembered how far I’ve come.  Three years ago, I was in a completely different situation, and I vowed to never be there again – and I wasn’t.

The whole point to this post is to drive home the idea that just because things have always been a certain way, it doesn’t mean they have to stay that way. You absolutely have the power to create the life that you want.

I also want to point out that while sometimes it’s easy to fall back to old habits and ways of thinking, it is also possible to drag yourself out and bring yourself back to the present.

Three year ago me is not present me.  I have grown as a person in so many ways, and I just needed to remember that.

Whether it’s three years ago, three months ago or three days ago, remember – you are here and you are now. You are not in the past, and it has no power over you.

Happy Monday.

Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash