A Proper Way to Ring in 21

I fled the country the summer prior to my 21st birthday. I came back 4 days before my big day, and when I came back it only took me a day to remember why I wanted to leave in the first place. The week started out well enough. I made it back to Wisconsin in one piece, and planned on spending a few days with my family before heading to Minneapolis to celebrate my first (legal) drink.

The first order of business I had to take care of was my car. The 1991 Berretta has treated me well over the last 10 years, but that's really because my parents have poured more money into that thing than my braces and college tuition combined. I think the only thing that hasn't been replaced is the paint job and the cranberry plush interior. (Clearly my parents were more concerned with safety than vanity.) So I take the car to the nearest Jiffy Lube to get it checked out before my 4 hour trek back to school. $300 later, I have new brake pads and I'm seemingly set to go. The assumption the car is in working order, relatively speaking. Apparently no one sweat prior to 1992 because my car has no working AC. (It never has, but as a 16 year old, I never minded.) To remedy the situation I leave at 9pm. I have enough Red Bull and angst-filled Pop CDs to last the trip, plus there is virtually no chance of traffic at that time in Wisconsin. I'm three hours into my trip, when something in my engine snaps. My car sounds like a go cart or the propellers of an old plane. It's so loud I can't hear my music (when it's late at night and i'm by myself, I really like listening to Ashlee Simpson - her screeching voice has a way of keeping me up). Well, at this point i'm screwed. I'm in the middle of nowhere, it's 1am, and i'll have to sit by myself on the highway if I call someone to pick me up. I proceed to drive the car at 35 on the interstate back to my apartment in Minneapolis. My usual 4 hour jaunt took almost 6. Another $300 buys me a reattached spark plug. And what I hope to be a safe trip back to my parents.

We spend the next night celebrating my birthday. As with any 21st birthday, there's an equal mix of shots and stupidity, and I found myself puking in a flower pot before making my way to my bed. Now this is where there's a learning moment, folks. Being the loving granddaughter that I am, I had promised my dear old grandparents that I would be at their place for lunch the next day. (They live 2.5 hours away from Minneapolis.) Between trips to the bathroom to ralph, I managed to set my alarm for 8am. I pull myself out of bed and trudge to the parking ramp to get my car. Somewhere during my 4 block walk, my phone falls out of my bag. I spend the next two hours looking for/calling my damn phone. There's no way I'm hopping into my car for a road trip without a lifeline. Finally I realize I should probably call my mom to tell her the bad news. I'm going to be majorly late for lunch. She answers her phone as if she's waiting for the morgue to call. A man had found it on the street and answered it when she called to check on me. The poor woman! The last thing time she spoke to me, I was on my way to my "first" bar trip, the next time she calls a man answers, telling her he found my cell on the street. I swing by the man's office to pick up my phone and I head out to my grandparents.

After two hours on the road, a warning light - for something COMPLETELY different than the brakes or spark plugs turns on. Then comes the "SERVICE ENGINE IMMEDIATELY" light. Now i'm really screwed. I'm so hungover that I can barely spell my own name, riding in a car in the middle of July with over 90-degree heat, and now I have my dashboard tell me I have approximately 30 minutes left in my life. (I figured I would probably be warned with a subsequent light, "DEATH IS IMMINENT" if my car was seconds from imploding.) I pull over at the next exit and fill my coolant reservoir with water in the hopes it'll drown out all these warning lights. Nope. I travel a few more miles, then stop in a gas station to buy coolant. Does that help? Nope. I end up driving the next 65 miles at speeds that rival a paperboy with 3 of my 5 warning lights on. What a warm welcome to adulthood.

The moral of the story? Parents shouldn't look to their vehicles to bring their children character-building experience. And hangovers and heat don't mix.

And yes, my car was eventually fixed. This time, I waited it out by doing puzzles with my Grandpa on the porch.