THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, September 2, 1994 TAG: 9409010217
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 07 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Over Easy
SOURCE: Jo-Ann Clegg
LENGTH: Medium: 91 lines
There was a time when I considered my car to be a means of getting myself from one place to another.
Not anymore. My Mercury has become nothing more than a fuel-injected, leather-lined way of carting stuff from Point A to Point B. Important stuff like old cereal, sale priced paper towels, gently used clothes and slightly read magazines.
The shift from transporting people to transporting stuff has been gradual. It started innocently enough back when my parents moved to town 10 years ago.
``Would you mind stopping on your way over to pick up milk for me?'' my mother would ask. Or ``Do you have a blue tablecloth I could borrow for a few days?''
No big deal. I'd put the tablecloth in the car so I wouldn't forget it or leave a note on the steering wheel to remind me to stop at the grocery store. My mother would return the favor when she was coming this way.
Then I started writing for the paper. Frequently there'd be a story or a roll of film to go in one direction, letters or negatives to go in the other.
It was easy to keep track of everything in those days. For one thing there wasn't so much stuff to worry about, for another my brain was a decade younger. That was also before the recycling bug had hit.
These days the alternative to throwing anything out seems to be to put it in my car to be taken somewhere.
Recently my transportation business has become a three-way street. The metaphor may be strange, but since my mother-in-law moved to town it's apt.
``Food Lion has a great buy on canned beans,'' she'll tell me during our daily telephone conversation. ``Do you want me to get you some?''
I tell her yes, that I'll pick them up the next time I stop by her place.
Later the same day it's my mother's turn. ``I was reading People in the beauty shop, but I didn't get a chance to finish the latest piece on Di. Would you mind bringing me yours when you get done with it?''
I get off the phone and put the Princess of Wales on the front seat, right next to the roll of film going to the paper and the bag of dusty but still good canned goods that I'm donating to the homeless.
The next morning Bill's mother has a request. ``There's a great buy on paper towels at Farm Fresh,'' she says, ``but that's too far for me to walk.'' I put a reminder on the steering wheel and buy a trunk full of it the next time I pass a Farm Fresh store.
On Friday I go to lunch with my mother and we exchange most of the contents of our car trunks. In addition to the copy of People that she wanted I gave her a jar of corn salsa that I've made, the needlework bag which she left at my place the last time she was here, a letter from Cousin Jane, a packet of pictures from the family reunion and a tablecloth which she has promised me she'll try to get the stains out of for me.
She, in turn, gives me a videotape of Cousin Joe's 50th birthday party, three letters from various cousins in New England and Canada, a decorative pillow she thinks will look nice on my spare bed, five coat hangers she's crocheted covers for, a lace fan that belonged to my Aunt Maude (``It'll look nice in the guest room,'' she says cheerfully) and four boxes of stale cereal.
``It's for Dominique to feed the ducks. Devonna will stop by to pick it up sometime,'' she explains. Dominique is a bright-eyed 7-year-old who's into serious duck feeding, Devonna is her mom. My car has apparently become a mobile link in the waterfowl food chain.
I cram the lot into my trunk, wedging it upright with packs of paper towels. I also discover that there's a zoom lens rolling around in there and a folding step stool. The lens I can explain. It rolled out of my camera bag. I have no idea what the step stool is for but I assume it's either coming or going somewhere so I leave it alone.
On Sunday when we visit Bill's mother a similar scene is played out. From the trunk we take a stack of People magazines, enough paper towels to soak up the Atlantic, two copies of Yankee and three of Southern Living, a magnet in the shape of a Coke bottle which we brought back from a recent trip to Atlanta, four boxes of cereal bought at a two-for-one sale, some leftover roast beef, six packs of her favorite lemonade mix and the step stool.
From her place we take the baked beans, a sack of food for the homeless, two boxes of Brillo pads she found at a good price, a winter coat she wants to donate to a good cause, two veal patties she wants me to try and the step stool.
``What's that for?'' she had asked when we brought it in. ``Beats me,'' Bill said. ``It was in the car so we figured maybe you had asked to borrow it.''
Her contributions join the zoom lens, a briefcase full of press releases, my extensive coupon collection and a bag filled with restaurant discount offers in the trunk of my car.
I vow that when I get home I will clean everything out and return my car to its original purpose of transporting people, at least for a week.
It's a vow that, even as I make it, I know I will not be able to keep. by CNB