A Series of Unfortunate Events

It's hot here. We're hitting around 80 degrees Fahrenheit each day, sometimes even 90.

I had a problem with the air conditioning in my car, so I went to Jiffy Lube and got it fixed. I didn't, however, have my driver's side door fixed.

Four months ago, my driver's side door gave up the ghost. It doesn't unlock; it doesn't open. Every time I get into my car, I have to get in through the passenger side and climb across the passenger seat and usually dislocate the windshield rear view mirror with my head.

"Well, why didn't you just get your door fixed when you got your air conditioning fixed, Awkward Mormon Girl?" Well, because I went to New York City. And bought new summer clothes. And I got a new phone and I'm getting a new laptop. But I don't have money for everything, especially not to fix one broken door when I still have three perfectly serviceable ones.

I do, however, have a little money to buy lemonade from the enterprising children on the streets of Hometown. Lemonade, mind you. Not that weird Kool-Aid some kids sell. I hate weird Kool-Aid, and I love all children except for the children that sell weird Kool-Aid.

Today, I was driving home from the temple in the blazing heat, wearing a lace dress. Which sounds light and breezy, but which I was actually given for Christmas a year and a half ago. The lace is lined with a fairly thick fabric, and the dark gray color does the opposite of discouraging heat. In addition to being warm, this dress gives me the problem all dresses do these days, which is to say it doesn't exactly stay put when I climb over the passenger's seat to get in and out of my car.

As I approached my neighborhood, I happened to see two girls about Baby Brother's age running a lemonade stand: fifty cents a cup.

At first I drove right past them, but then I considered that the price was right and that I was very thirsty. I decided to go back.

This decision required a lot of commitment, because when I drove past the lemonade stand had been on my right. I had to not only turn around to get back to the lemonade stand but turn around a second time so that I could pull over on the right side of the road.

A week ago, Pepper and I were driving in her car. She pulled over so we could buy lemonade from a lemonade stand. The children accepted payment and offered the lemonade through the passenger's side window. It was sort of like a mirror of a drive-thru, and quite easy.

I guess I was expecting similar service this time around, but neither of the lemonade stand girls came to take my order. They instead glanced at my car in bemusement.

I was like, "I guess I'll have to go to them," but then I realized that meant climbing over the passenger's side seat in my lace dress and Sunday shoes.

So I gestured to the lemonade stand girls: "Come here."

They didn't come there.

That was when the part of my brain that isn't involved in making decisions, but probably should be, said, "They probably think you're a kidnapper."

"Aw, man," I said when the rest of my brain realized the part of my brain that isn't involved in making decisions but probably should be was right. So I climbed across the passenger's seat and dislocated the windshield rearview mirror and got out of the passenger's side door with much climbing up of the lace dress.

I walked to the lemonade stand with as much dignity as I could. The children looked somewhat terrified.

Feeling the need to defend my status as a non-kidnapper, I explained myself: "My car door is broken, so I thought maybe you could come to me, but...it's okay."

"Oh...sorry," said the girls. But it didn't seem like they believed me. Probably because you know who else makes excuses for suspicious behavior? Kidnappers, that's who. So there really isn't that much difference between kidnappers and non-kidnappers. Except for the kidnapping part.

So instead of viewing my excuses for suspicious behavior as evidence that I was a non-kidnapper, I'm pretty sure that these girls took my excuses for suspicious behavior as evidence that I was a kidnapper. They seemed quite anxious for me to leave. They didn't even bother counting the handful of coins I used to pay for my lemonade.

I took the plastic cup they thrust at me and walked back to my car. Somehow, I found a way to get in through the passenger side, climb across the passenger seat, and once again dislocate the windshield rear view mirror with my head, my skirt riding up all the while, without spilling a single drop.

I consoled myself after going through this harrowing misunderstanding: "At least I got some lemonade on this hot, hot day."

I took a celebratory sip. The lemonade was actually weird Kool-Aid.