“Check out what Dean Davis is driving! A big black Ford truck! Is that cool, or what?”
“Dean Davis” is my daughter Kathy, associate dean of the Poole College of Management at North Carolina State. One of the female students commented on her unusual mode of transportation.
Recently I wrote a column about family members and their connection to vehicles. I noted that all of the stories involved my husband and sons, thereby concluding that emotional attachment to motor vehicles is strictly a male thing. Now I am compelled to retract that conclusion. My daughter must have acquired the same gene that is evident in her brothers. (She also inherited her father’s ability to fix anything that needs fixin’.)
Soon after building Cross Creek, a log home in the mountains of Carroll County, Kathy began to dream of buying a truck some day. At present their cabin is a respite for her family – a haven of peace and rest on weekends and vacation times. During their escape from the routine of city life she and Skip enjoy making improvements – clearing underbrush, planting wild flowers, and arranging interesting rocks she finds on her hikes. A truck would surely come in handy, she reasoned.
At Christmas, when the cabin is decked with holiday decorations, a live Christmas tree, and a blazing hearth, they invite us to join them for an old-fashioned celebration. Of course, sometimes access can be difficult, if snow blocks the half-mile driveway from the paved road. When the cabin becomes their permanent home after retiring, a truck with four-wheel drive will be a necessity. But that day will not arrive for a few more years, so her truck remained a daydream – until last Thanksgiving.
Each year since their marriage, Kathy and Skip have spent the Thanksgiving holiday in Knoxville with Skip’s elderly aunt. Last year Kathy loaded her aged Ford Escape with the makings for a festive dinner and headed west on I-40 with the girls, Erin and Sarah, and Cara and Syrah, their two dogs. Skip had left his workplace in D.C., picked up his mother in Richmond, and was already in Knoxville awaiting his family’s arrival.
When Kathy was about thirty miles from her destination, black smoke suddenly began to pour from the Escape and it gave up the ghost. A cell phone call brought Skip to the rescue and the family arrived safely at Aunt Gracie’s. The Escape was not so fortunate. Towed into Knoxville, it received a dire diagnosis – a blown engine (thrown rod), not worth fixing. Kathy had said she would drive it ‘til it died. She did.
Determined not to let the situation spoil the holiday, they proceeded to prepare dinner and celebrate as usual. They even shopped the discount stores on Black Friday. Then they faced the reality of securing a means of transportation for Kathy.
Leaving the girls and the dogs to enjoy the remainder of the weekend, they headed back to Raleigh to shop for a car. But Kathy fell in love with a black Ford 150 pickup, four- wheel drive, with an extended body and an eight-foot bed. “I’ve always wanted a truck,” she said, “and now is the time to get it!” So they sealed the deal and headed back to Knoxville to get the girls, the dogs and the license plates from the dead Escape. And then, once again, return to Raleigh.
So that’s why Dean Davis drives a cool truck to work five (or six) days each week. And every available weekend she and her two dogs head for the cabin in Carroll County.
It wasn’t a male thing after all.