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Thermo-nuclear Wedgies

2.June.2005

Some things in life are inevitable. Death, taxes, getting a thermo-nuclear wedgie at least once during jr. high and having your daughter total your car.

We have just experienced that last one. It’s akin to the thrill of a thermo-nuclear wedgie but with more drama and less underwear involvement.

Allowing your teenage child to take possession of thousands of pounds of machinery that moves and is controlled by the uncontrollable was never a good idea. I’m amending my Parental Belief Declaration to include a new section entitled Drivers Licenses Shall Not Be Awarded To Any Person Below The Age Of Thirty Five Under Penalty Of A Thermo-nuclear Wedgie. This amendment comes right after the paragraph on Why Body Piercings Are Evil and Things That Make Your Mother Cry.

If this rule had been in place last week I would have entirely missed out on the following conversation.
    Daughter’s Friend: “Pam?”
    Me: “Yes?”
    Daughter’s Friend: “This is Whitney. I’m calling because Stephanie is really freaked out. I wanted to let you know she’s ok, all right?”
Well of course she’s ok. She was ok when she left here earlier to go to the Mall. Nothing better have changed in the OK Department in the past hour.
    Me: “What do you MEAN she’s all right? What happened???”
I add those extra exclamation marks here because I’m certain if you had looked above my head you would have seen them there during this conversation.
    Whitney: “Stephanie had an accident but she’s all right”
    Me: (Clenching teeth) “What happened?”
    Whitney: “She um….well, she kind of hit me, but she’s all right! I swear she’s all right and I’m all right”
    Me: Telling myself to count to ten and breathe. Just breathe.
    Whitney: “There is a kind of a hole in the bumper but that’s all, honest.
I refrained from asking her what a ‘kind of hole’ was exactly, because I was sure I didn’t want to know. Instead I asked her if the van was drivable and she gave me a reassuring response. Apparently it was the kind of hole that still allowed the vehicle to function on a basic level. Everything else was fine. Just fine.

Note here to parents: When a teenage friend of your teenage child has to call you because your own child is too freaked out to call you, be advised that the ‘tiny hole in the bumper’ story is akin to saying that Scott Peterson had marital issues.

I finally got my daughter on the phone, ascertained that she was all right (which was good, because as her mother it was my right to hurt her when she got home) and told her to drive home. After all, there was just a small hole in the bumper, right?
    Stephanie: “Right.”
I probably don’t have to tell you here that the entire front of the van was caved in, the hood was buckled, the radiator had been slammed into the shape of a U and I was hyperventilating at this point. What had she hit? A steel plated Hummer? Mt. Rainier?

No, she’d slammed into the hitch of a Suburban and not left a scratch on it. If the world ever ends, I’m going to hop into the nearest Suburban because I’m quite certain that people in Suburbans are the only ones going to survive the apocalypse.

After my breathing returned to normal I hugged my crying daughter and gave her the pat parent speech of ‘I’m so glad you weren’t hurt, it’s only a material thing, it’s not as important as you are, it can be replaced, you can’t. Now give me your license because you’re not driving again until you’re thirty-five years old’. She was having breathing issues at this point because I was hugging her so fiercely. Who says love doesn’t hurt? Then I gave her a thermo-nuclear wedgie.

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editor's note: due to stoopid people who can't behave in public (ie, spammers) we have had to turn off the comment feature on our older columns. We'll try waiting a while and then turning it back on to see if they get bored and go away. In the mean time, we will manually add any REAL comments if you email them to us. The link is below.

You are absolutely AMAZING!! To think that you can take such an event (and yes, I have lived through such things with my daughters as well...) and create a funny piece that gets us laughing and introduces us to the concept of thermo-nuclear wedgies...well, you are amazing! What more can I say. Needless to say, I am glad that it was "just a small hole in the bumper" -- yeah right! But, I truely am glad that she was okay.... Keep laughing!! You still, if memory serves me correctly, have several years of teenage wisdom or lack thereof, to endure, right?? Hugs Lee
Lee Ambrose
USA -
BooHoo! So sad to hear about your car. Unfortunately, I don't think it matters how long they wait to get a liscence. Even I had a few minor accidents. But not that bad... The good part about waiting is that after they leave the house, it isn't your car! Good luck with everything!
Jeri Lynn
Shoreline, WA USA -

Scripts modified from Matt Wright's guestbook. His scripts can be found at Matt's Script Archive

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