Image via Wikipedia

A while ago, my sister, Joan, her husband, David, and their two year old daughter, Summer, moved in with us. Soon after, David was driving drunk with Summer in the car. The police arrested him and I had to pick Summer up from the police station so she wouldn’t be sent into protective custody with social services. Joan was pregnant. David spent the night in jail and Joan was deciding whether or not to bail him out once bail was set by the judge. I thought she should do whatever she could to help David get better. She decided to bail him out in the end.

That same week, my truck was impounded. While I was stopped for a registration problem, it turned out my truck had been reported stolen. It turned out to be a mistake, but I was without my vehicle for a few days intil the police could sort it out. So, Joan’s mini van was impounded because of the drunken driving incident and my truck was in the lot parked right next to hers. We needed to drive into town (we live out in the country) to run a few errands. Luckily, we had two trucks left to choose from. She had an older black Dodge which hadn’t been washed in ages, a broken dash and no heat. I had a camouflage Ford truck with heat, but holes rusted through in the floor and dodgy starter. We opted for the Dodge. Did I mention we live in Minnesota and this happened in the winter? So, we were in for a cold drive.

My kids were in school, so we just had Summer with us. We stopped by the police station. By now, they knew us by name. It is a small town. We ran by the DMV and the post office. Finally, we made it to the grocery store. We pulled into the parking lot. Summer announced, “mommy, my poop hurts.” So, Joan said she would have to change her before we went in. She looked in her bag and realized that she was out of wipes. “Why don’t you use paper towels for now, we’ll buy some wipes inside and change her again in the bathroom?” Joan grabbed Summer out of her car seat. I turned off the truck since we didn’t have heat anyway and waited in the driver’s seat until this was finished, relieved I didn’t have to deal with diapers any more.