MY LIFE AS A CAR

Karen Douglass

My car is beige, the color of dirt. I didn’t always drive beige, a sedan at that. Once upon a time I was wild and drove a plum-colored Camaro. It almost killed me skidding on black ice. Camaros of any color can slew on black ice. I have a faint scar under my bottom lip where I met the steering wheel when that plum of a car hit the light pole, a car meant to make me invincible—fast, powerful, under my control. I hated the ice and the pole, but not that car with its white leather seats—okay, maybe they were vinyl. My beige car has beige cloth seats. I never meant to be a beige-sedan person, but here I am, scarred, bitter. I went from the Camaro to a blue Mustang, a step toward sanity, which is also beige and dirt colored.

Karen Douglass, MA, MFA A displaced New Englander now living in Colorado, she has been a grad student, college instructor, parent (still is), poet, novelist, horse trainer, race-track judge, and psychiatric nurse. She has published five books of poetry, three novels, and a memoir. Her blog and full publication list is at KVDbooks.com.