Sometimes I Hate Being a Woman

No, this isn't about menstrual cycles or hormones or dresses and make up or anything like that.

I am a stereotypical woman with my car.  I don't drive well, I can't park, and I certainly don't know how my car actually works.

(Magic is still the winning option so far.)

And the kicker is that I have a used car with quite a good number of miles on it.  And very little money to get what I needed done on it done.

I'm part of the lucky contingent of 1st-world people whose parents still help them out with things like healthcare and car maintenance.  Mostly because they're friends with our mechanic, and not myself.  (Not that he's not friendly, just that, well, he's a male authority figure and I'm terrified of authority figures as a general rule).

Anyway, so I have a light come on in my car today, and I'm behind on getting my oil changed, and my exhaust pipe needs to get replaced, and a lot of other things, so I'm like, a little freaked out, but at the same time, I'm kind of like, it came on, and went back off again.  It can't be that serious.  So I get to where I was headed, and luckily there's a Sears here with an automotive center and I'm like, cool, I probably just need oil, I'll get some there and refill it.

And then I look up what the light means on google and I start freaking the fuck out.

It's not a serious light unless it stays on while you drive, but it's not one of those lights you can just ignore, either, like the "Change oil soon" light or the "Washer Fluid" light.  And so I'm like, mildly panicking because I cannot handle this right now, I have a lot of shit happening all at once and when I get busy, I get really stressed out because I cannot handle not having time to do things.  I just can't.  I'm absolute shit at not having any time for relaxation, or plans changing, or emergencies.  I always plan for that kind of time, and this next week is not gong to allow for that at all.

So I'm a little stressed out, as you can imagine.  And my study buddy comes in and she's like "no, it's just a warning, we'll get you some oil in your car and everything will be fine." and it helps a whole bunch, and then I go out and make sure I actually need oil, and it turns out I do and that's what the problem is, and I just need to relax because I'm not going to die, nothing's gone wrong yet, and I still have plenty of time to screw things up.

But I wish I wouldn't panic every time this kind of thing happens to me.  I wish I had the ability to just be like, Okay, no here's how we handle this situation, get a move on, everything's going to be fine.  Like the men I know in my life.

But in reality, I understand very few guys these days even know how cars work (magic? voodoo? praying to gods unknown?  Transformers, robots in disguise?) and so I'm likely to be left even more confused and worried than reassured and confident that things will be fixed.

Ah well.

Until next time, dear readers
Me