A close encounter on the M40
There's a light drizzle as I point the car onto the sliproad. Eyes on the runway ahead, I press firmly down on the accelerator. My knuckles are white on the steering wheel, but this isn't 'Top Gear'. More like 'Driving School'.
With hubski on a training course for his new job, it falls to me to take our left-hand-drive Toyota to a car dealer in Nottingham, shedding the last vestige of our French life in the process. I have little idea of how to get to Nottingham from Oxfordshire, except to follow my dad (who is giving me a lift home) in the car ahead. If this arrangement sounds a little slipshod, let me tell you that this is pretty damn watertight by my family's standards.
The left-hand lane of the sliproad is taken up by a thundering juggernaut. In a moment of wild, non-self-preserving recklessness, I decide to cane it down the right-hand lane, overtaking the world's biggest lorry in the process, and then to shoot out effortlessly onto the M40, as if I casually defy death every single day of my life.
What actually happened was that I drew level with the lorry and was teleported to a far-off dimension resembling the inside of a car wash. The spray from its wheels totally engulfed my poor little Yaris. Worse, the lorry driver seemed to be unaware of our existence, and the roar of its engine grew deafening as, in a casual, absentminded kind of way, it drifted over to my lane, in the same, casual, absentminded way of someone hogging your armrest in the cinema.
Except in this case the stakes were rather higher.
Windscreen wipers slashing wildly, I could see nothing, hear nothing, feel nothing. This must be what it's like in the final split second before death in some terrible accident, when you realise there's no escape. Fully expecting to be crushed by the lorry, now only inches from my wing mirror, or crushed from the other side by motorway traffic, I lost the ability to move or think, and just kept my foot down on the accelerator and waited to depart this life. I've heard stories of people who've had near-death experiences and describe seeing their entire life flash before them, or their late granny beckoning them towards the pearly gates, or experiencing some kind of spiritual epiphany. At the risk of this reflecting badly on me, my last insight was roughly: 'Ah, sod it'.
But then the din receded and we (my trusty Yaris and I, for we bonded that day for the first time) shot out onto the motorway just as, I swear, the sun broke through the clouds and I embarked on the second, or possibly the third, or the fourth, of my nine lives.
I lost sight of my dad around Birmingham and ended up buying an A-Z of Nottingham (if anyone wants it e-mail me as I have no intention of ever returning there) and navigating my/our way to the car dealer. But that was nothing to someone only two hours into a new life.
All in all it was an emotional day. As I stood in the garage forecourt and bid our Toyota a silent farewell, I was surprised to find my eyes fill up with tears. I'm not into cars and thought I had no sentimental attachment to ours. But it felt like leaving behind a member of the family. So many memories and trips were tied up with it, that the new owner would neither know nor care about. It felt wrong. I wished I didn't have to leave it.
And I think that counts as the first stab of French nostalgia. There really is no way back now.
With hubski on a training course for his new job, it falls to me to take our left-hand-drive Toyota to a car dealer in Nottingham, shedding the last vestige of our French life in the process. I have little idea of how to get to Nottingham from Oxfordshire, except to follow my dad (who is giving me a lift home) in the car ahead. If this arrangement sounds a little slipshod, let me tell you that this is pretty damn watertight by my family's standards.
The left-hand lane of the sliproad is taken up by a thundering juggernaut. In a moment of wild, non-self-preserving recklessness, I decide to cane it down the right-hand lane, overtaking the world's biggest lorry in the process, and then to shoot out effortlessly onto the M40, as if I casually defy death every single day of my life.
What actually happened was that I drew level with the lorry and was teleported to a far-off dimension resembling the inside of a car wash. The spray from its wheels totally engulfed my poor little Yaris. Worse, the lorry driver seemed to be unaware of our existence, and the roar of its engine grew deafening as, in a casual, absentminded kind of way, it drifted over to my lane, in the same, casual, absentminded way of someone hogging your armrest in the cinema.
Except in this case the stakes were rather higher.
Windscreen wipers slashing wildly, I could see nothing, hear nothing, feel nothing. This must be what it's like in the final split second before death in some terrible accident, when you realise there's no escape. Fully expecting to be crushed by the lorry, now only inches from my wing mirror, or crushed from the other side by motorway traffic, I lost the ability to move or think, and just kept my foot down on the accelerator and waited to depart this life. I've heard stories of people who've had near-death experiences and describe seeing their entire life flash before them, or their late granny beckoning them towards the pearly gates, or experiencing some kind of spiritual epiphany. At the risk of this reflecting badly on me, my last insight was roughly: 'Ah, sod it'.
But then the din receded and we (my trusty Yaris and I, for we bonded that day for the first time) shot out onto the motorway just as, I swear, the sun broke through the clouds and I embarked on the second, or possibly the third, or the fourth, of my nine lives.
I lost sight of my dad around Birmingham and ended up buying an A-Z of Nottingham (if anyone wants it e-mail me as I have no intention of ever returning there) and navigating my/our way to the car dealer. But that was nothing to someone only two hours into a new life.
All in all it was an emotional day. As I stood in the garage forecourt and bid our Toyota a silent farewell, I was surprised to find my eyes fill up with tears. I'm not into cars and thought I had no sentimental attachment to ours. But it felt like leaving behind a member of the family. So many memories and trips were tied up with it, that the new owner would neither know nor care about. It felt wrong. I wished I didn't have to leave it.
And I think that counts as the first stab of French nostalgia. There really is no way back now.
posted by francesca tereshkova | 1:16 PM
3 Comments:
It's funny how you get to feel about cars, isn't it? Even ones that have let you down more times than you care to count, and cost you a fortune into the bargain. They have taken part, indeed been intimately engaged in your daily goings on; taken you to hospital to have your child, taken you on holiday and so on.
Your M40 experience sounds scary. I hate motorway driving in the rain!
Hi Francesca, like you I have just returned from France to the UK and am find ing the adjustment un peut dificile mais pas trop. I get a little misty eyed about my previous life in France but then I remember my experiences at work amongst the aspiring middleclasses and I shudder and thank my lucky stars that I made the shift back here. Yes the roads are better, the health sysytem works very well, the food is generally far superior to that of the UK, and all of that stuff that takes those retired dreamers to a life of shangrila in some rural graveyard in deepest France. Give me the dirty, smelly, crude and honest UK every time.
By the way I do have need of an A to Z of Nottingham, let me know the what is required. I am best contacted at steve@bien-trouve.com
All the best
Steve
Gosh, how weird, my remarks went all anonymous on me...
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