Picture it. Thanksgiving morning, 1999. I was 7 months pregnant with my daughter and we were heading to my in-laws’ house on the PA Turnpike in the middle of a massive downpour, in our little VW Golf, with a 130 lb Newfoundland in the backseat recovering from knee surgery that she had a few days prior.
Now, when I say “downpour” I mean SHEETS – you could barely see anything in front of you. It truly was scary. And then… our windshield wipers stopped working. They got stuck in mid-wipe. So we went from driving HALF-blind, to driving FULLY-blind! My husband, in all of his 28 year-old wisdom, yells “Hang out the window and unstick the wipers!” I was like, “What?! I’m 7 months pregnant (and my belly size screamed 9 months). It’s flippin’ 40 degrees out and POURING!” He replied, “Want us to crash instead? If not, start hangin’!”
So, there I was, barely able to hang out the window with my insanely sized belly – sopping wet from the waist up, pushing the wipers up and down as fast as I could. We clearly were not going to make it driving like that for 45 more minutes on the turnpike. And where in the world were we going to get the wipers fixed on Thanksgiving Day?!
Left with no real options, we simply had to pull off at the next exit. And there in front of us was our Thanksgiving Miracle! An itty bitty gas station. It had a little shop the size of a large closet. The man working at the station couldn’t fix the wipers, but he said he had this “stuff” – you spray it on the windshield and it kept the water off. We were so tired and frustrated from our long ride, and just had no other options, so we bought the can of spray and hoped for the best.
Let me tell you … that can of spray was the BEST THING EVER!!! We drove the rest of the way – in the continued downpour – without using our wipers AT ALL! And we could see perfectly. The rain just flew off the windshield. No joke!
This old story/memory all came back to me on Monday, when I was visiting that little bundle of baby (only the baby was not in my belly this time, but in college). I was driving home from UMass in a major downpour and was thinking how thankful I was for that crazy can of “stuff” we found all those years ago. For the last 20 years we’ve been treating our windshields with RainX (the now very popular option vs our little can of no-name from 20 years ago) before any long drives – just in case of rain. I always look around at the other cars and see their windshield wipers going at 100 mph. I get to have my wipers on intermittent. It is SO much less stressful to drive in a downpour when you can actually SEE!!
If you don’t like white-knuckle driving in big stormy weather, give RainX a try! It will honestly change your bad weather driving experience forever!
Seeing Clearly,
Laura
Laura,
That is such a great story – such a precious memory!
I was actually pregnant at the same time and we used to travel to Connecticut every year on Thanksgiving day, so I can totally relate to your situation, and we didn’t even have an “easy pass!” Can you imagine lol!
I especially like your comment about you only be 28 years old. Oh, how we thought we knew it all back then!
I will
View moreLaura,
That is such a great story – such a precious memory!
I was actually pregnant at the same time and we used to travel to Connecticut every year on Thanksgiving day, so I can totally relate to your situation, and we didn’t even have an “easy pass!” Can you imagine lol!
I especially like your comment about you only be 28 years old. Oh, how we thought we knew it all back then!
I will definitely try that “stuff!” Thank you for the tip!
I’m glad everyone was okay! Enjoy the memory for years to come!
View lessHi Pam –
So glad you liked the story! If you drove up to CT every Thanksgiving , you definitely can picture the situation! Long drives, frayed nerves and no cell phones or Easy Passes!! 🙂 🙂
RainX honestly is some great stuff — makes all the difference on those long stormy drives!
Thanks for commenting!
Laura
Hi Pam –
View lessSo glad you liked the story! If you drove up to CT every Thanksgiving , you definitely can picture the situation! Long drives, frayed nerves and no cell phones or Easy Passes!! 🙂 🙂
RainX honestly is some great stuff — makes all the difference on those long stormy drives!
Thanks for commenting!
Laura