Oprah asked me to face Maggie and to tell everyone what I had promised my adorable little automobile. I tried to steady myself on my shaky legs, a deer in Maggie’s headlights.
“I ...”
“I told her I would drive her.”
Gasp! Cut to commercial.
I do want to drive her. She’s so cute and friendly and I truly believe I could park her with minimal damage to surrounding vehicles. Thing is, I’ve been saying I don’t want to drive for so long now that it’s kind of my cause. If I sat behind the wheel, I’d feel like a PETA activist who suddenly discovered she liked fur. Even worse, I’d feel like all the finger-waggers won, and I’d have to live with their self-satisfied smiles in my rear-view mirror for the rest of my life.
But I’ve ignored my Maggie. I’ve ignored my driving desire to tail old people.
The camera zooms in as I get down on one knee in front of Maggie and say, “maybe I should just get my bloody license, and formalize our arrangement.”
As the credits roll, the audience cheers, and I realize that Oprah is right––it’s never that straightforward. If the camera had closed in on me once again, you would have seen that my darkest fear is in fact that if family, friends, and strangers aren’t so busy wondering why I don’t drive, well … maybe they’ll start wondering why I don’t cook.
