moment of clarity

The seat position was all wrong. I was clearly too close to the steering wheel. I hadn't noticed it right away, but after a few minutes on the road I became exceedingly uncomfortable. The mirrors were wrong, the seat was wrong. Somebody had been driving my car.

It was probably Tina, my daughter. At fifteen she thought she knew how to drive, but I had NEVER given her permission to climb into the driver's seat of my Toyota. This was inexcusible. I was distracted from my discomfort for awhile, thinking of how I was going to punish her... no driving until she was twenty. No dating. No going out with friends. No TV, no phone, she could have KILLED herself!

And then I noticed the bag.

That bag, on the floor of the passenger seat, the one that wasn't mine. It just... well, it wasn't mine. But it was here, in my car. Clearly someone had left it behind. One of Tina's friends. Or even Tina herself. I reached over, keeping one hand on the steering wheel and trying not to take my eyes off the road for more than a second.

The bag was small, like a cosmetics case, but it was stuffed full of something. And it was light. I placed it on my lap and kept driving like that, bag on my lap, afraid of what I would find. Cigarettes? Drugs? Probably pot. But this would be a LOT of pot. I hoped it wasn't pot. I reached down with one hand and unzipped the bag, keeping my eyes on the road until the bag was completely open... I looked down.

Diapers.

Three diapers and a small plastic bag of wipes. That's it.

What the hell was Tina doing with diapers, I wondered. I just couldn't come up with an answer. I flung the bag back into the passanger seat and ran my fingers through my hair. I checked my reflection in the mirror, wondering if I had messed it up too much... and I saw the stuffed animal in the back seat. Stuffed animal?

I looked down. The floor mats were not scuffed with sand and dirt, but there were cracker crumbs. I opened the glove compartment. My snow scraper was gone, but there was a package of fig newtons.

Oh my God, I said. This is not my car.