Me-Haul?

When I moved away from Wisconsin, it was the right thing to do. I’d begun to cultivate what some may consider to be an unnatural disposition for cheese, I was referring to pop as “soda,” and the very thought of the Green Bay Packers wasn’t nearly as revolting as it had been in years prior. Cleary, it was time for me to move on. Not that I disliked the people there, mind there, it was just time.

The only downside to moving to the Twin Cities was the actual act of moving to the Twin Cities. This was because I did it in a small UHaul, during which time I realized that I had the potential to be, if I put my mind to it, the worst commercial truck driver in the history of the world.

I hated driving that UHaul. I was constantly looking over my left shoulder to check my blind spot, despite the fact that the UHaul had no back windows that I could use to accomplish said task. It took several hundred failed attempts before I began to get used to this phenomenon. At that point, I began to try and use the extra mirror equipped on the truck, which allowed me to see my blind spot, but which also warped the reflection so badly that I couldn’t tell if the cars behind me were a mere few feet away, or perhaps in Michigan.

So I sort of just guessed. When I needed to change lanes, I’d put on my signal, wait for about ten seconds to let everybody get out of my way, and then slowly merge over, all while praying to various deities, some of which I'd made up on the spot, to keep me safe.

And that was just in Wisconsin. When I hit rush hour in St. Paul and Minneapolis, it got much, much worse. I’ve pretty much blanked the entire experience out. I believe that I closed my eyes, gritted my teeth, and shrieked my way through the entire ordeal. (Sort of like how I got through college.)

The sad thing is, the UHaul was pretty tiny, for truck standards. Any big rig driver would just roll their eyes if they heard my petty complaints. However, in my defense, I was used to driving Stratuses and Accords and Escorts, where if you looked over your shoulder you were pretty much staring into the trunk.

Anyway, somehow I survived and made it to the Twin Cities, and after kissing the ground several times, I vowed to never again drive a UHaul, even if it was the only means of transportation available to spirit me away from a horde of marauding zombies or – even worse – marauding lawyers.

Flash forward to just recently, where I again found myself moving, this time within the Twin Cities area. Despite my previous experience with the UHaul three years earlier, and the adamant vows I’d made after miraculously emerging from it unscathed, I’d foolishly rented another one and was standing in a parking lot in Crystal, Minnestoa, staring it down.

“So,” I said, as I began to realize the full ramifications of the Pandora’s Box I’d just opened, “we meet again.”

Honestly, I said that.

I wondered if this was somehow the same UHaul I’d driven before, and if it was now doing its best to keep a straight face, knowing that it had a first class ticket to some major entertainment in the near future, namely me freaking out as I drove it into a lake or a Wendy’s.

And here’s the best part: This was a ten-foot UHaul, like I’d driven from Wisconsin, and it was sandwiched between two much bigger trucks, making it look like their child, or perhaps their pet wiener dog. Despite the fact that I didn’t even want to drive the 10-footer, a small part of me, driven entirely by male pride, was embarrassed that I was renting something so small. “You should have gotten a bigger truck,” that part of me said. “If anybody sees you in this wimpy piece of junk, you’ll never hear the end of it!”

I calmed my male pride by promising that I’d drive wearing a fake moustache and a fedora as a disguise.

Fortunately for me, and unfortunately for everybody who wants to read a disaster story along the same lines as Sharknado, here’s where the story falls flat: After all of this dramatic buildup, the move actually went fine. I didn’t drive into lake. I didn’t create a new entrance into a grocery store. I didn’t somehow find myself airborne, as if I was participating in a scene right out of the Dukes of Hazzard. Instead, I survived by driving like an eighty-year old man – which isn’t that far of a stretch for me anyway. I hugged the right lane of the freeway, kept to minimal speeds, and watched as cars streamed by me on the left, all while mostly keeping up with the occasional tortoise on my right.

When I dropped the UHaul off, having aged about a decade in several hours, I vowed again that this would be the last time. I would never move again! And if it I did, I’d sell all of my stuff and start over from scratch! I’d be like Jack Reacher, traveling around with a toothbrush and an ATM card, and buying my clothes on the fly! (Although I’d probably be the one always getting beaten up.)

I meant it this time! Seriously!

Which means it’s just about guaranteed that I’m going to get transferred to Iowa any day now.