In my life there are always things popping up, here and there, that I have to deal with. Anything from sick kids (or sick me) to something breaking in my house… or my car.

Sometimes I get lucky and only one thing happens at a time. Lately though, I haven’t been so fortunate.

But I have been blessed with the ability to find humor in my situations. Especially with my car! For example:

Last spring, I was driving home, trying to beat the bus as it was dropping my kids off from school. It was already unseasonably warm, near the end of the school year, and I was having A/C issues. My driver window wasn’t (and isn’t) working, so I couldn’t roll it down. I had the others rolled down, though.

The gas needle is also “not working” and I can never tell exactly how much gas I have in the tank at any given time, unless I remember (haha) to write down my mileage on my gas receipts. And that’s only IF my odometer stays lit on my dash, because my dash has a mind of its own right now and just randomly decides it isn’t going to show me my odometer, but switch languages at random instead!

So far, I know my dash reads in English, Spanish, French and some other language that resembles alien verbiage from the digital planet of “let’s mix letters and numbers together.”

So, my dash is flashing language options at me and not showing me my mileage, no A/C, windows down, gas needle on E, and I’m driving home to beat the bus… on a gravel road. Close your eyes and picture the scenario painted for you here.

I reach the final quarter mile, uphill, and…. She died.

The. Car. Died.

On a hill. A quarter mile from my house. On a gravel road. In 90-degree weather.

Oh, it gets better!

Now, the vehicle has had several other issues, so I sat there for a few seconds thinking, Please, be out of gas. Please! That’s fixable!

I grabbed my phone to call my grandpa up the hill, to see if he could bring me some gas, in great hopes that he would be home.

And my phone was dead.

“Seriously?!” I scrambled around my massive vehicle, searching frantically for a charger to plug into my dash so I could make the call. In that moment I vowed I would never allow my children into the vehicle again with anything in their hands. It was trashed!

I couldn’t find a charger. Dust was kicking up from all sides every time a vehicle drove by.

I could hear the bus coming.

It appeared at the top of the hill. Lights flashing, stop sign swinging out, it slowed to a stop in front of my driveway a quarter mile in front of me as I sat there watching from my dusty driver’s seat.

I started to giggle. Then, I began laughing. Deep, belly laughs that I’m almost certain could be heard atop the hill by my sons as they looked down the hill in confusion from the end of our driveway.

They all came running down the hill with their bus creeping behind them, and I had tears rolling down my face from the laughter by the time they reached me.

The bus driver stopped and checked on us. I told her, between gasps of air from laughter, that I was just going to get gas from my grandpa up the hill, but my phone was dead so I couldn’t call him. She said his truck was home. Thank God!

I sent the boys back up the hill to get him and the bus driver continued on her way to drop off the rest of the kids on her route.

I sat and waited, still laughing.

Grandpa and the kids came down the hill in his truck. Thankfully, he had a gas can that had two gallons of gas in it.

Grandpa pulled his truck around behind my vehicle and got out to pour the gas into it. After he finished, we all crossed our fingers and held our breath as I put the key in the ignition.

Click. Turn. Engine started!

YES!

Everyone piled in and we drove up the hill to our driveway. I pulled in, parked it, turned it off, and collapsed against my seat in relief!

Now, that’s just one story of many involving my 2003 GMC Yukon Denali XL and its troubles.

Our most recent situation with the poor thing is that it doesn’t start. Something is clearly drawing power from the battery, and it has spent many days hooked up to a slow charger, so it won’t be dead when I go to start it.

I would joke about my car being hooked up to “life support” with cords and things connected to it, hood up, or another car parked beside it to jump it when needed.

Recently, Dad got a “kill switch” for it. It’s this little remote that’s on a fob attached to my keychain. Every time I get out of the car, I hit that button, disconnect the battery from everything with a “click” and voile! It starts for me when I get back to it and “click” it back on again.

Of course, we are only treating the symptom. The bigger issue is still in there, but for now… at least it works. Well, it works as long as I remember to hit the “off” button on that fob. Which I have forgot to do once already!

Life is a journey! There are many chapters for us to enjoy (or endure)! The past few years of mine, I have referred to as “the constant struggle”, but not out of bitterness. More out of humor. I have learned that the “laugh or cry” look at life can have a positive effect… if we choose to laugh.

Plus, laughing burns more calories (still not enough for me!), and the lines left on your face after years of laughter are happier looking than the lines left after crying for years. And like I said, it’s been years for my little army.

We will have this broken vehicle until I either make enough money to purchase another, or by some miracle one appears in my driveway. So, until then, I’m sure there will be plenty more tales to tell about my Moody white Mammoth.

So, all of that for this takeaway:

When you’re stuck in a dead car, uphill on a dirt road, and it’s summer temps outside, and you got dust in your eyes, your phone is dead, and your kids are watching you from up the hill… have a little laugh at your own expense. Laugh till you cry, if you must. But still, laugh.

My kids live with me. They see that we are struggling here and there. They live in this little house with all its quirks, breaking parts, and drafty windows. They ride in that car, when it works, and they know. They already know we are in a rough patch. They don’t need to see me crying over it. They are already concerned for me anyway, bless their sensitive little hearts!

But when I laughed, they laughed, and it was good. We all felt a little better for a minute. And that’s what matters.