Many decades ago I was at a florists on Valentine’s day.
There were two teens in the store, and I got a “skeezy” feeling off them.
I ignored the “skeezy” feeling.

They then each produced a Glock 9mm and held the store up.
At gunpoint.
A terrifying experience.
A 9mm round at point blank range to the head or torso will fuck you up.
It will surely make you unalive.
Even a shot to a limb could unalive you, or fuck you up forever.

I vowed to never ignore that little voice, that little twitch in my brain.

Last Friday I let myself down.

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I woke up with that wiggly little feeling.
I thought that the car dealership would call.
We were going to a friend’s house for lunch and board games, but I knew we would be home well before.

And then I forgot about the wiggly little feeling…Until my wife checked her voice mail at 7:10 that night…10 minutes after the dealership closed.

The message they left was direct, blunt, impersonal: Your car is ready.

Ok, what’s the problem you say?

In 11 hours my wife will be on a train bound for Paris to visit the grand bebe and family.

Out of the kindness of her heart she hauls her laptop to Paris so she can attempt to resolve the situation. She has small windows of opportunity between trains and calls the dealership.

“Hi, you called yesterday to let us know the car is ready, I’m mme xxx”

Who?
What Car?
We have 3 Peugeots on the lot.
Yeah, the boss is on vacation until Friday.
He has all the information on his computer, we don’t have the password.
What is the license plate?
(My wife is now in motion to capture the next train for the next leg of the trip so the answer will wait till Monday)

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It is now early Monday, (too early), and later, time allowing, my wife will call the dealership with the license plate later today, mostly out of curiosity to see if the car is actually ready. We’re well into a month.

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Worth restating is that the owner and ostensibly the staff are trumpists. A short dialogue the day we started to buy the car revealed that he loves what the president is doing, etc. My wife tried in vain to allow him the wisdom of our actual experience living in Los Angeles, but he had “seen the documentaries” and well…

My fear is that all these shenanigans are in reprisal to the attempt at education…

The two people we talked to were gun nuts. One a factory trained sniper, the other, a wannabe cowboy. I thought of pulling out some Special Forces memorabilia in a lame-ass attempt to convince them that despite not being a trumpist, that I was worth talking to.
I want my car.

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France is France.
France is not ‘Murica.

Week one here and I thought I had managed to “retune” my wavelength, or at least my expectations of “their” wavelength. This car thing has me wondering how well tuned I actually am…

I still recall the scene vividly, I went to the marche to buy a water filter or at least bottled water. The water in the gite we were staying at was cloudy with calcium. We were afraid we would grow new teeth or something.

At the march it was 8:15 in the morning, there were employees inside and cars in the lot. The door did not open.

I looked at the hours posted clearly on the door, looked at the people inside, looked at the cars in the lot, and with an air of certainty that my “Americanness” was enough, I tried the door…again…

I realized then and there that I was vibrating at a different frequency. There was an impedance mismatch. I am simply spinning my wheels. God forbid you plug a Frenchie into my old lifestyle, they would blow an output transistor.

So I dropped a significant amount of American entitlement (I use American ironically) and went to the patisserie and bought some chocolatines.

For me, it was just a matter of re-tuning, replotting my frequency response to match the French lifestyle, and until this whole car thing, I was doing a good job or at least I thought so.

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Buying a car off a lot has always been a different experience for me. Select the car you like, new or used, then drive away in it.

The dealerships have arteries of communication between them, the banks and the bureaucracies. It is well lubricated. It is lacking friction. It is smooth.

If you have the credit and all your ducks are in a row, they will cram you into a car faster than a barista can sling a triple shot grande macchiato at the Starbucks drive through.

So coming here, dealing with this car effect twice now, I am left wondering how well tuned I really am.

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After some pondering I do wonder if my distrust in the system is somewhat attributable to the trumpist idiot that, as a non-english speaking, non-us person, would not be welcome as a resident on American soil.

I wonder of this is retribution rather than process.

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More importantly, I wonder how well tuned I really am.