Day Ten/Eleven: accidents, reunions, and settling

So this weekend I went home. It was only supposed to be a night. I was going on Friday night and going to come back to newaygo on Saturday because I had to work. Well that definitely did not happen. I got home and was super excited to see my parents and my brother. I miss them an awful lot these days. It just so happened that they were working a fish fry at the school Friday night, which gave me enough time to go visit my lovely friend Crystal who just moved into a new house. She lives on that side of the state and I haven't seen her in months! So as opposed to staying at the fish fry and following my mom around like a puppy, I opted for visiting Crystal.

On my way to her house I got lost and had to turn around. When I turned around there was a Public Transportation bus that was dropping someone off at a pretty sketchy motel, so when a bus stops in front of you, what are you supposed to do?? Stop, correct! Well the two cars in between myself and the bus stopped, then I stopped. The guy behind me on the other hand... he wasn't paying attention and his BIG VAN hit my poor little car. I watched him coming at me in the rear view mirror and helplessly watched him barrel into the back of my car. I pulled off into a parking lot figuring that the guy would follow me and we would have the exchange of information, the calling of police, etc... Wellllllll as I pulled off, he drove past me and angrily stared at me as if it was my fault he hit me, then proceeded to speed off. I looked at my car and there wasn't anything wrong besides a couple of little cracks in my bumper, at least that I could see. I looked in the road and there was just a little bit of rust that had obviously fallen from my darling car. The people who had gotten off the bus taught me a lesson. They had their hands full of groceries, they looked as if they had gotten evicted from a trailer park and the second I saw them I judged them. When I pulled into the parking lot though, they dropped their groceries and came over to make sure I was okay. They made sure that I knew that they saw what happened and that if I was going to make a police report they would be there to say something.

Then I went to Crystal's. We had a lovely visit and for a while I was able to forget about what had just happened. I left Crystal's house and went home, My car seemed like everything was fine... until I turned down my road. I went down the first hill and suddenly my car got VERY loud and wouldn't shift or go any faster than 15 mph. I didn't want to go home and tell my dad, but I knew that I had to. It seems like every time I have been home lately, there is something wrong with my car. Something that he ends up paying for to be fixed. Something that he cannot afford. I was supposed to be going back to newaygo the next day and I couldn't drive with it like that. When I told my dad he was mad. He was mad that I didn't call the police. He was mad that I got hit. It sent me right back to the time I hit a deer. It sent me right back to feeling like I was in high school. It sent me back to feeling like I wasn't good enough.

I sent a text to my manager saying that I wouldn't be able to make it to work the next day. My dad took my car to get it looked at and the damage is extensive and will take lots of work and money. I know it is stressing him out. For the meantime my dad let me borrow his truck. He is so awesome and I love him so much.

As for the settling part, my mom always told me not to settle.
I feel as if I might be settling here. Not being settled exactly, but settling for a life that is just a boring story. Settling for a story that has no substance, no real meaning. And I'm not okay with that. I need to figure out how to address this for sure.