Anyway – here’s the tale.
I had just left a little pizza place north of Knoxville with my family after a nice pizza buffet lunch. We were out in the parking lot getting ready to climb into the trusty family SUV and head home when suddenly there they were! It was a man and a woman in an old mid 90s era Chevy Camaro or Pontiac Firebird. I can’t remember which, but I’m fairly certain it was one of them. If you’ve ever been in one of these cars, you know that interior cargo room was not their main selling point. They were meant to be affordable little sporty numbers for people with small or non-existent children. The back seat was just kind of a short bookshelf that was put there just so the marketing department could call it a four passenger vehicle. In order to make the most of the limited space, the cars had a large trunk/hatch lid that could be lifted up to reveal a reasonably sized area for groceries or small luggage. You could maximize this area further by folding the back seat down and opening up the space a bit more. This meant you could carry somewhat larger items if you could finagle them around enough to slide them on top of the folded down seats. Keep the term “somewhat larger” in mind as you read on.
The woman was driving. She had the driver’s side window down. After all, it was a nice day. The wind was tossing her light brown/dark blond hair around. Her male companion was in the car also. Was he in the passenger seat? No. He had a job to do that required him to ride elsewhere in the vehicle. Well then, you might say, he must have been wadded up in the back seat. Perhaps he was really small or missing some limbs that made that part of the car just the right size for him. No. That’s not entirely true either. It’s difficult to describe using only words, but maybe this will help…
Various times in my life I have had to move from place to place. We all do every now and then. One time I used a service called “Two Men and a Truck”. This is a real company and when you hire them you get exactly what the name implies. It works really well. They charge by the hour. You don’t have to do any heavy lifting and they have their own truck. Now, only in Knoxville, Tennessee, it seems they have new emerging competition. I’ll call them “Two Hicks and a Hatchback”.I really tried to capture the moment with the cartoon I drew. The male was straining with all his might to hang on to the bureau or chest or whatever it is you call that wooden behemoth that was jutting out of the back of the car. You could tell that he was stretching his right arm to its absolute limit to try to keep the furniture piece from bouncing and/or sliding out onto the street. Heaven only knows how his other limbs were employed doing the same thing. I could only see the one arm from my vantage point. He didn’t look too comfortable to say the least.
The other thing I want you to notice is the beaming smile on the female’s face. Why shouldn’t she be happy? Her man has herculean strength that she is sure will steady a 200 pound chunk of wood regardless of hairpin turns, speed bumps, sudden evasive maneuvers to avoid raccoons and even minor traffic accidents. He also will apparently contort himself into any painful, injurious and embarrassing configurations just to satisfy her every whim. What a guy!
