Wiping....Oh, Never Mind

I love to drive. Spoiler alert: I'm going to whine a little bit. My previous van was a Honda Odyssey. It had a ghostly check engine light that never went out, even after I spent thousands of dollars trying to figure out why it was on. But other than that, it was a great van. It was aerodynamic, had a moonroof, and cradled my buns in heated luxury all winter long. 

Ghostly check engine light

But that van has passed on to the big van cemetery in the sky after a very unfortunate Christmas Eve smashup that wasn't nearly as fun as the musical variety. I'm hopeful her organs were donated to assist other vans that were struggling with various ailments. I would feel better knowing Berta was living on and helping others. 

The remains of Berta. May she rest in peace.

My new van, a 2009 Chrysler Town and Country, doesn't have a moonroof.This should not be a major issue, but it is. Instead of smelling the first fresh breezes of Spring flowing through the van, I get a faceful of gravel spit up through my lowered driver's window by the duelly pickup racing by on its way, apparently, to hunt beavers from atop a child's swingset, as made evident by the rack of guns in the rear window and the entire tree sliced up in the bed with a rusty swingset holding the wood down. 

My Odyssey was properly set up for a person driving with hand controls. This is something that auto manufacturers don't spend much time considering, since disabled drivers are a tiny fraction of a fraction of their customers, but it matters to me - a lot. 

When I realized my sweet Berta was dead, I realized, too, that I would never be able to get another Odyssey. And I was right. The insurance property settlement gave me a pittance that could only get me into a lesser vehicle ("our job, as an insurer, is to put you back in the same condition you were in one second before the accident" said the insurance adjuster. "Oh yeah?" I replied, "well, in that case, one second before the accident I was driving a fully loaded Honda Odyssey with heated leather seats and a moonroof". He grew very quiet). 

So here I am with my Chrysler Town and Country with 150,000 miles on it, which was all I could afford given the amount the insurer was willing to pay for it. I had my dear friend, Mary, test drive it for me. She test drove two vans for me on a day so frigidly cold our snotcicles could have won awards. But she was there, despite the cold, to help me at a difficult time. Friends like Mary are rare, priceless, and precious, and should be treated as such. I cannot wait for the day when I can give back for all the wonderful help she provided for me. I know someday she will need my help, and I will be there, front and center, no questions asked. Mary helped me into each van, and then climbed into the driver's seat and gave me honest feedback on both. But the one thing I didn't think to ask (because I haven't had enough vehicles since being in a chair to ever have had this problem) was, "what side are the lights and wiper controls on?". I now know that this is a very important question to ask. 

                                                  Hand control lever

The picture above shows my hand control. To drive, I must constantly pull this lever downward. To stop, I must push it forward. I cannot take my left hand off the hand control when the vehicle is in motion (unless cruise control is activated). 

                                            arm with windshield wipers -front and rear

The picture above shows how far the wiper controls are from the hand control (the black bar behind the cruise control bar to the forefront). To activate the wiper blades, I have to let go of the hand control. What happens when I release the hand control? The same thing that happens when you take your foot off the gas pedal - rapid deceleration, which is very bad on a highway, byway, tollway, sidewalk, bike trail, turnpike, county road, trunk highway, gravel road, or even the driveway. If it starts to rain, I have to pull over, stop, turn on my wipers and rear wipers, and then continue on my way. 

                                                  Knob to control lights

That knob back there is the headlights. Look how far they are from the hand controls. 

Now, if I wanted to take up a job as the getaway car for bank robbers, then I wouldn't worry so much about not being able to turn on headlights when it gets dark. I tried the opposite - just leaving them on all the time, but that didn't work out very well. It seems that when you leave your lights on all the time, your van doesn't run at all. Seems a little silly. But I acquiesced and went back to turning my lights off when I wasn't in the van, and turning them on as soon as I turned the van on - that way if it gets dark, my lights are already on. It's a simple compromise but that button still taunts me...it says to me in a gritty whisper, "look at meeeee, don't you just want to reach out and turn me onnnnn?". And the very disturbing answer is, yes! I do, I do, I really really do!! 

My Chrysler has DVD players in the ceiling (that I'm sure we will never, ever use), a bluetooth feature I can't figure out how to use, a back up camera that has such glare I feel like I'm going into the light every time I back up the van. "Stay awaaaay from the light!!! Don't go into it, don't even LOOK at it!!" (sorry, I got distracted by memories of my favorite scary movie, Poltergeist, but I digress). It has buttons out the wazoo. I can't change the radio station by just turning a knob - I have to use arrow keys and push them repeatedly until it finally lands on the station I want. The previous owners pre-set every country station between Minnesota and Arizona. One of these days, when I have the Chrysler back in the driveway, I'll have to spend a weekend trying to figure out how to change the pre-selects on the radio. I only need two: MPR 88.9FM and KOOL98. Yes, I am an old fart. I sit with an afghan and a cat on my lap all day, what did you expect?

For the time being, I'm driving a Dodge Grand Caravan. It's fully modified with a ramp and a fancy swivel base on the driver's seat so I can spin in circles and, if I ever have some left over pea soup, I can play "Exorcist" and turn in circles while sitting in the parking lot at Walgreens. The reason I'm driving this Dodge is that my Chrysler is being modified the same way. I hope to get it back in the next week or so. It needs an oil change and a wash and I lose sleep over these things. Plus I really want to give that "Exorcist" plan a try. That would be a fun way to spend a Tuesday afternoon. 

Next week, I'll post a video of how the van modification works. It's nifty! 

In the meantime, I appeal to Chrysler and Dodge to change the position of the wiper bar and the lights and to put the cruise on the steering wheel. For now, I'll do some of my own modifications using some yarn, a few paper clips, some gorilla glue, a little duct tape, two magnets, a jar of rubber cement (not because I need it for the project, but because it smells so good!) and nine eye bolts. 

So if you see me out during a rainstorm driving without lights or wipers, I will claim to be a ghost rider and drive away really fast. You won't even know what just happened. I'm sneaky like that.