you can shift now.

<---   this is me.

<--- this is my car. decorated by ten year olds.

 <--- this is my boyfriend, jacob.

<--- this is his car. well... one that looks like his. i found this one on google.

my car, whose name is sam (and that's a GIRL sam), is a 2003 ford focus. my car has a six CD changer in the dashboard, awesome windshield wipers, a really big trunk, and is an automatic.

jacob's car, whose name is algernon, is seventeen years old, has crank windows, barely functioning airconditioning, scary seat belts that move by themselves, and is a stick shift.

my dad drives a stick shift. when i was little he had a car exactly like jacob's (but one year newer and a lot nicer) and i always watched him shift gears. when he got my car when i was twelve, i kept waiting for him to shift gears with the emergency brake and i never figured out why he never did.

he told me that driving a stick is a very good and valuable thing.

in my other blog, i wrote about i drove jacob's car to his friend alex's house and i screamed and cried and it was absolutely terrifying. i came home from allegan super duper proud of myself and told my father that when the time came for my brother to take my car to alma, i could drive his car to IPFW to learn how to say 'hablo espanol, donde esta el bano?'

last weekend he let me drive his car to my cousin's house, which is about two miles away, to see how i did city driving. and i was like, fo sho, i got this in the bag, i am SO down, i did this at jacob's, it was GRRRREAT

and i stalled. and stalled. and when i finally got going after sitting through three lights, i kept popping the clutch, shifting into the wrong gear, stalling some more, and i eventually completely stalled the car out trying to pull onto my cousin's driveway. then i left the clutch in and we rolled into the middle of the street.

today, i drove jacob's car from carroll high school to my house and didn't stall. i then drove his car to steak n' shake, drank a fantastic milkshake, got stopped at four lights, and drove on the busiest road in fort wayne. i didn't stall a single time. i only stalled once in the way home.

i'm not entirely sure what's up with this.

i'm thinking that since jacob's car is ancient and seasoned, the clutch is nicer. maybe i secretly love algernon and he secretly loves me. maybe i'm just more comfortable with my boyfriend than with my dad.

but something is totally up and i need to figure it out before my brother comes home to steal my car. because once that happens, i'm shit out of luck if my dad's car hates me.

he calls his car little red. this reminds me of little red riding hood. THAT reminds me of my intro to lit analysis my first year of college. little red riding hood got raped in that class. a lot. and she menstrated a bunch, too. no, no, not in the actual story, but in the symbolism.

when my dad calls his car little red, i cringe. because all i think of is devouring innocence and periods.

i WILL find what's up with this, and eventually, i'll drive a stick shift, all by myself, to spanish class. but by the time that rolls around, i'll be half fluent.

that's a long time from now.