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July - Sept. 2010
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The Motor Home Deal
By Cliff Popkey
truck driver may have
helped me make it look easy she was still confidence that she could handle it
just the same without ever trying to do it before.
She backed out of the driveway with little trouble after all it was a straight shot. Then she managed to even turn the home, without taking out the mail box, and park it relatively straight in the road in front of our house. But when it came to backing up into the drive she discovered it wasn’t that easy. After numerous tries she decided that she needed to drive around the block to get a better line for backing up into the driveway. So off she went. Thankfully the trip was uneventful with the only difficulty encountered when she had to turn the corners. At thirty-three feet long it was difficult to turn if you were inexperienced at driving a vehicle of such length. Luckily she didn’t encounter any other vehicles and the only damage done on the excursion was to several of our neighbor’s lawns and a few landscape bushes.
Once back at the driveway she called the daughters out to help guide her and she began to back into the driveway. On each side of the driveway, as landscape texture, we had placed large granite stones about three feet high, when stood on their ends, upon which she had painted our house numbers in big bold white letters and then glued solar powered lights on top to illuminate them at night. We made all the difference in the world on rainy nights because our neighborhood had no street lights and on those dark nights finding our driveway until we placed the stones had been a major chore.
The daughters were instructed to stand on each side of the driveway and to call out to my wife if she was getting close to the large stones. It was a good plan until you factored in the fact that the youngest daughter was only five and would barely yell loud enough to be heard over the TV and it was a major challenge to get her to pay attention for more than a minute unless it involved TV or something on the radio. Then add to that the fact, the fact that the older daughter had chosen this day to train her bird and my wife was headed for disaster.
Several attempts had been aborted due to the close proximity of the large stones and the wife was getting frustrated by the lack of communications skills our youngest daughter exhibited and the lack of attention by the oldest. Slowly yet surely though she began to make progress in placing the motor home in the driveway and was on what she had hoped would be her final approach when the oldest daughter began yelling loudly and stepped behind the motor home. The youngest daughter left her safe spot on the opposite side of the driveway as well stepping behind the motor home and forcing my wife to jam on the brakes.
Before my wife could even get out from behind the wheel to see what was wrong, the daughter’s bird flew in the drivers window of the home and landed on her arm. That explained the mass confusion behind the home. With disaster averted my wife instructed the oldest daughter take the bird inside the house and put it in its cage and the youngest daughter to stay out of the driveway by the front porch. She then confidently slipped back behind the wheel and placed the home in reverse and gunned the engine thinking she would be heading straight up the driveway.
The first clue that she had a problem came from our five year old, when she began to wave her arms frantically with a horrified look on her face. The second clue was the very loud crunching sound that filled the home a moment later as the wife continued to back up. The final clue was when she was jolted in her seat, followed by a another loud thud and the motor home coming to an unintended stop.
In the confusion of the runaway bird, she had unknowingly turned the motor home’s steering wheel to the left and when she gunned it, it went straight over the large stone on the right hand side of the driveway. Her momentum had forced the motor home to knock over the stone, to roll up and over it and it was now wedged underneath the home.
The loud crunching sound had been the PVC plumbing pipes that run under the home which were now scattered about the driveway in small bits and pieces having been shattered by the impact with the large stone.
The neighbors having heard the raucous came out side to see what had happened as well as our daughter with her bird on her shoulder that promptly flew away. The neighborhood children took up the chase of the runaway bird and the adults all stood around looking at the damage to the motor home. As luck would have it, the husband of the couple who were our best friends in the neighborhood, happen to be employed as an RV sales and repair specialist in a nearby town. His wife had called him immediately upon looking out the window and having seen the disaster unfolding hoping he could come to the rescue. Being such a great friend and neighbor, he jumped in the company’s tow truck and raced home.
While all of this was happening I was working and when the boss told me to leave early and enjoy my trip I jumped in the car and raced for home hoping to get an early start. I should have known something was wrong when I reached the turn into my subdivision. I saw my neighbor turn in, just ahead of me, driving his tow truck. He never drove it home on the weekends, only during the week and then only if he was going to use it to help someone. It didn’t cross my mind that he was coming to help me.
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She backed out of the driveway with little trouble after all it was a straight shot. Then she managed to even turn the home, without taking out the mail box, and park it relatively straight in the road in front of our house. But when it came to backing up into the drive she discovered it wasn’t that easy. After numerous tries she decided that she needed to drive around the block to get a better line for backing up into the driveway. So off she went. Thankfully the trip was uneventful with the only difficulty encountered when she had to turn the corners. At thirty-three feet long it was difficult to turn if you were inexperienced at driving a vehicle of such length. Luckily she didn’t encounter any other vehicles and the only damage done on the excursion was to several of our neighbor’s lawns and a few landscape bushes.
Once back at the driveway she called the daughters out to help guide her and she began to back into the driveway. On each side of the driveway, as landscape texture, we had placed large granite stones about three feet high, when stood on their ends, upon which she had painted our house numbers in big bold white letters and then glued solar powered lights on top to illuminate them at night. We made all the difference in the world on rainy nights because our neighborhood had no street lights and on those dark nights finding our driveway until we placed the stones had been a major chore.
The daughters were instructed to stand on each side of the driveway and to call out to my wife if she was getting close to the large stones. It was a good plan until you factored in the fact that the youngest daughter was only five and would barely yell loud enough to be heard over the TV and it was a major challenge to get her to pay attention for more than a minute unless it involved TV or something on the radio. Then add to that the fact, the fact that the older daughter had chosen this day to train her bird and my wife was headed for disaster.
Several attempts had been aborted due to the close proximity of the large stones and the wife was getting frustrated by the lack of communications skills our youngest daughter exhibited and the lack of attention by the oldest. Slowly yet surely though she began to make progress in placing the motor home in the driveway and was on what she had hoped would be her final approach when the oldest daughter began yelling loudly and stepped behind the motor home. The youngest daughter left her safe spot on the opposite side of the driveway as well stepping behind the motor home and forcing my wife to jam on the brakes.
Before my wife could even get out from behind the wheel to see what was wrong, the daughter’s bird flew in the drivers window of the home and landed on her arm. That explained the mass confusion behind the home. With disaster averted my wife instructed the oldest daughter take the bird inside the house and put it in its cage and the youngest daughter to stay out of the driveway by the front porch. She then confidently slipped back behind the wheel and placed the home in reverse and gunned the engine thinking she would be heading straight up the driveway.
The first clue that she had a problem came from our five year old, when she began to wave her arms frantically with a horrified look on her face. The second clue was the very loud crunching sound that filled the home a moment later as the wife continued to back up. The final clue was when she was jolted in her seat, followed by a another loud thud and the motor home coming to an unintended stop.
In the confusion of the runaway bird, she had unknowingly turned the motor home’s steering wheel to the left and when she gunned it, it went straight over the large stone on the right hand side of the driveway. Her momentum had forced the motor home to knock over the stone, to roll up and over it and it was now wedged underneath the home.
The loud crunching sound had been the PVC plumbing pipes that run under the home which were now scattered about the driveway in small bits and pieces having been shattered by the impact with the large stone.
The neighbors having heard the raucous came out side to see what had happened as well as our daughter with her bird on her shoulder that promptly flew away. The neighborhood children took up the chase of the runaway bird and the adults all stood around looking at the damage to the motor home. As luck would have it, the husband of the couple who were our best friends in the neighborhood, happen to be employed as an RV sales and repair specialist in a nearby town. His wife had called him immediately upon looking out the window and having seen the disaster unfolding hoping he could come to the rescue. Being such a great friend and neighbor, he jumped in the company’s tow truck and raced home.
While all of this was happening I was working and when the boss told me to leave early and enjoy my trip I jumped in the car and raced for home hoping to get an early start. I should have known something was wrong when I reached the turn into my subdivision. I saw my neighbor turn in, just ahead of me, driving his tow truck. He never drove it home on the weekends, only during the week and then only if he was going to use it to help someone. It didn’t cross my mind that he was coming to help me.
Next Page>>