Road Warriors*
*Those of you prone to post-event worry, or those of you considering road trips with me may want to skip this post. Let me direct you to some highlights or a hilarious prank.

Sticking it out, are you?

The snow had been blanketing the road and the now-invisible countryside? cityside? world, around us for several hours. I gripped the steering wheel, tense and excited. My passenger/DJ/navigator/new partner in crime/possible last person I'd see on earth, calmly sat as she spun patient relaxing tunes/took over as my eyes/believed in me/possibly prayed; only revealing her nervous jitters, like her southern accent, when speaking to her parents. The tell-tale yet coded sighs had gone silent. It was too dark and too far to my right to see if any of the now famous smile remained.

As the windshield shrank and the wipers collected ice, I shifted in my seat, hands still glued to the wheel, trying to keep sight of the white road below me. For a while I had the last of a wiper swath to look through, but the icy build-up on my blades soon took that from me too. I rolled down my window to attempt an Ace-Venture-style technique, but quickly found that my face wouldn't stand for the pelting snow. My head bobbed and danced as I looked for some way to continue down the road without discontinuing our lives. It was like watching TV without an antenna (and no cable), yet Clare,my favorite reality TV show critic, was now crucial to this actual reality. With poise, she began to direct my efforts through her windshield view.

We made our way slowly, likely traversing across the lanes, though rarely slipping, as my little Saturn outperformed SUVs. I rolled down the window to keep an eye on the concrete divide. I saw no sense in hitting that. A few times Clare waved me in the appropriate direction, until finally we were able to wind around and around and around the longest entrance ramp to a New Jersey Service Area. We wiped off the snow and cleared ice from the wiper blades. After answering a call of nature, we returned to the winter wollop already in progress and continued our slow push south on the turnpike. In minutes the windshield returned to its near useless state. Without a trace of external panic, Clare and I went through the same motions again. I clung to the steering wheel, slip-sliding as necessary and pushing on. I rolled my window up and down trying to catch a bigger glimpse of anything. We followed the dim lights of a snow plow and any other real or imagined glimmer of hope I could find. Clare again bravely dug in, leaned forward and managed to point and wave us to a hotel near the airport. Cars ahead struggled at the stop sign while the Sheraton sign shone like a beacon above. Even after waiting nervously for the cars in front of us to right themselves, my wonderful car plowed on and skidded to a stop outside our ridiculously overpriced new home in Newark.

Giddy with life, yet exhausted by a trying drive we collapsed into a fit of yoga, snow angels, handstands, room service with a side of twenty questions, giggles, and perhaps the greatest collaborative game with a clear winner of all time- Break the Bucket. Not yet available in stores!