Ours is no longer a twelve-passenger van. Not since the dog chewed through one of the seat belts. And now that the kids are getting bigger, we can’t fill all three seat belts in one row. There has to be a buffer zone between egos and personal spaces. So when you discount the front passenger seat which no one likes to sit in because the door is so hard to open, it’s more like an eight-passenger van.
Every few months, we scramble the seating arrangement. Who will best tolerate whose presence? Which two personalities should never breath air in the same three square feet of space? Who can handle the added responsibility of sitting next to the baby?
Right now, the boys are mostly in the back.
An older one in each row with a younger boy. The most volatile is on the inside, where it is harder for him to reach out and ‘encourage’ whomever is annoying him.
Girls sit in front.
They’re not as loud, which means I can hear them and still keep up with the back rows where the majority of the action –and the noise — takes place.
Talk about distracted driving.
It’s a delicate duo of diplomacy and preemptive strike critical to the peace and interpersonal harmony of the family.
This week, the odometer on the van rolled over the 200,000 mile mark. We bought it from a Mennonite dealership in Pennsylvania seven years ago with 27,000 miles on it.
You do the math.
We do the driving.
A big van, it turns out, is a catalyst for developing all sorts of latent skills.
Judging height, for instance.
Like the time we were trying to park in downtown Washington, DC. A parking garage was conveniently available near one of the Senate office buildings whose sign, swinging in the breeze off the Mall read ‘Max. Ht. 6’10”.’ I wasn’t quite sure how tall we were in the van, but since our friend who is 6’6″ had to duck down to look in the doors, I figured we were okay.
We weren’t.
But that day, along with learning we need a clearance of 7′, I also learned how to communicate ‘BACK UP!’ to a line of cars which spills out of a driveway and down the street.
Other skills come with practice.
Like how to parallel park a full-size van in a spot previously occupied by a Hyundai Elantra. The secret is in the angle of approach, but the maneuver is entirely dependent on a the width of the street’s shoulder.
Of course, learning to parallel park in a van involves spacial judgment and depth perception, which one develops quickly, after a few close encounters. We installed convex mirrors on the side view mirrors. Best $1.98 I’ve ever spent.
Getting the van back out of a parking place is tough, too. Forget a three-point turn. We’re talking eight, maybe ten. Sometimes, ours comes out only by prayer and fasting.
Like when the sporty little candy-apple red Nissan parked along the curb directly behind the parked van. I backed up without even knowing it was there until the sickening crunch, at which point my four-year-old piped up, helpfully, “Not again, Mom!”
My favorite skill, however, developed through necessity, the proverbial mother of invention, involves eating in the van. You probably don’t let your kids eat in the car. I shouldn’t. It would extend the life of the interior, which will probably have rotted away long before we lose the engine.
I call it “Annie Oakley of the Van.”
This skill takes many years of practice to develop, and requires excellent hand-eye coordination. Here’s what happens:
Child in the back seat, some eight feet from Mom behind the wheel, announces for the third time, “I’m hungry! Is there anything to eat up there?” Mom, ignoring the fact that the last snack was distributed a mere fifteen minutes ago, roots around in the snack bag between the front seats.
Finally, her hand alights upon a box, and while simultaneously maintaining speed, course, and tracking the nearest intercept, she removes the lid and selects an individually wrapped nutrition bar. Hefting it twice for weight and wind resistance, Mom glances in the rear-view mirror, makes eye contact with the target, and without turning her head, hurls the bar over her shoulder toward the back seat, where it lands in the lap of the undernourished child.
Novices may find it helpful to preface the hurl with a shout of “Duck!” until sufficient skill has matured.
The truly proficient Mom can, with a single glance in the rear-view mirror, fire off eight Clif bars in a row, each landing in the lap of a different child.
Don’t try this with cans of soda. And don’t ask how I know.
There are some negative side effects to driving a big van, however.
Ripped skirts from the long climb into the driver’s seat.
Feelings of overwhelming vulnerability when driving smaller vehicles.
Danger of UFOs inside the vehicle when braking suddenly or swerving.
Oh, and the part about not seeing everything they’re doing back there. Or not knowing if they cleaned up their apple cores. Until a week or so later.
I admit to feeling envy when the Lambourghini dealer’s “We-come-to-your-house-and-wash-your-car-for-life” truck passes me on the Dulles Toll road, especially when I know the coating of dirt from our road has been inscribed with ‘Hey you!,” and “Wash Me,” by my budding Van Goghs. I am reconciled to less than pristine carpets, windows covered with Trader Joe’s stickers, and Cheerios in the seat. And I don’t even mind that the van was manufactured in a different century, because as long as it lasts, it’s our home away from home.
Driving East or West, van is best.
