Bumper Cars

Well, us, along with almost every other church in Nashville, have called off services for today. The roads are just way too icy. I learned that first hand this morning. It was quite an eventful morning all before 9 am.

Dad left last Thursday to go do a seminar in California and he flew back in to TN this morning at about 8 am. Since we called off services I went ahead and picked him from the airport. Now, being from the North I do have experience driving on icy roads but what TN has that IL does not have and that is hills and lots of them. That does make it harder even for the experience icy road driver. But I knew that I did know how to handle the car in case I had trouble. So at 8 am I climbed into dad's car and slowly made my way to the airport. I was so excited and proud of myself because I had no trouble whatsoever.

Now I'm putting in a little side note to TDOT here. When snow has fallen or is in the process of falling. Salt and brine are not going to keep the roads clear. You have to actually plow them. But you would think common sense would tell them that. Murfreesboro road was nothing but one huge ice rink and had not been plowed once since the snow fall we got on Friday. This is Sunday!! Plow the roads people! Maybe that's why Nashville has had at least 300 car accidents. You have got to plow the roads in addition to laying salt and whatever to the roads. Since Nashville is obviously capable of getting about 6 inches of snow and ice at one time you would think they would get enough equipment to handle this. But it's Tennessee and they just don't have the common sense it seems. Its frustrating.

Anyway, I pick dad up from the airport and we head back home with me driving. Again, I'm having no trouble at all and then we turn onto the road that my parents road is on. We make it up the first hill and then as we approach a road turnoff we see up ahead a car stuck in the middle of the road. So we decided to turn at the first street and go that way to our house. No problem. We start up the hill and realize that its a sheet of ice with no snow for traction. Dads car is a front wheel drive so I was pretty confident but when there is no snow for traction you pretty much can't do anything. so we start to slide a bit. I automatically stop the car and put in park and dad comes around to get in the driver's seat so I don't have to slam into someone else's car (which probably would happen as soon as we put the car in gear.) So dad gets in and put the car in reverse hoping that we can just slowly creep back down the hill so we can get back to the main road. Well, we start sliding backwards and fast. Dad had lost complete control of the car and now this is where it gets funny. I was laughing during the incident and laughing hysterically afterwards. :) We were headed for a house with lots of cars in the driveway and I knew we would hit a few of them. So dad opens his door (while pumping the brakes) and stick his other foot out the door to try and stop the car Fred Flintstones style. This was hilarious to me at the time and I still chuckle when I think about it now just two hours later. Well, obviously that wasn't working and miraculously the car spins a 180 so now we can see ourselves hurling towards cars and mailboxes. Dad somehow manages to swerve the car away from the other cars and we end up someones front yard. Of course, I was praying the entire time that the Lord would keep us safe and not to hit anything so the first thing I said after we stopped was "Thank You, Jesus!" Which dad thought was funny and started laughing. We both were shaking and laughing and amazed that we didn't hit anything at all and no one got hurt. So we get back out on the main road and decide to go up that hill because there was more traction and we just drove around the cars stuck in the middle of the road. There were people there helping them so we didn't need to stop and help. We finally made it home safe and sound and thankful my mother wasn't with us or she would have been freaking out!

Now I'm back at my parent's house, in my pj's watching the movie "Breakdown", where I plan to stay the rest of the night.

Happy Sunday!