A while back, I stared at my 90-something mother who was looking up through the steering wheel of her Ford Fusion. My father had, of his own accord, prudently decided to quit driving, but Mom was holding on. Finally, I bought the car and with no vehicle to drive the problem was solved.
I didn’t get the big deal back then, but I do now. While I’ve been driving since I was 16, for the past four years I have been chauffeured around à la Miss Daisy whenever my sweetie pie and I were on the island of St. Croix where we have a home. The reason? Simple. We rented cars and to add another driver would have cost an extra $25 a day. Since we stay for months at a time that adds up, so I resigned myself to riding shotgun.
Until now. The local Avis rental facility was having a fleet sale, and after a modicum of deliberation, we drove off in a cute, shiny blue Nissan Kick, a sort of baby SUV. We needed nothing big—since the island is only 28 miles long and seven miles wide—and there’s no point in buying a fancy car when one lives beside the sea. While the view is lovely, the salt spray eats vehicles in an inordinately short amount of time.
When Ryan handed me my set of keys, I felt a tingle of excitement and maybe just a bit of anxiety. My apprehension was understandable when you consider that on St. Croix people drive on the left side of the road, like they do in England and 75 other countries worldwide, mostly due to the legacy of the British Empire.
In case you’re wondering, Americans prefer the right side because back when horses were pulling wagons, the driver generally sat on the left side of the buckboard to better see what was coming their way. So, when cars started populating the roads they took up the right side. Old man Ford of the Ford Motor Company—ever the entrepreneur—started producing automobiles with the steering wheel situated on the left side to accommodate the new American drivers, and it is those cars that populate my little island. So we drive on the left side of the road while also manning the vehicle from the left side.
Admittedly, it takes a little getting used to. Those right hand turns in traffic—or what passes for traffic here—can make one pause. In any case, I feel as if I’ve got my mojo back. There is a certain sense of freedom in picking up the keys and saying, “See ya!” But as I buckle up, I have to remember that useful little phrase when driving on the left side of the road: “Ass to the grass!”
Wolf Catcher
Anne Montgomery
Historical Fiction
In 1939, archeologists uncovered a tomb at the Northern Arizona site called Ridge Ruin. The man, bedecked in fine turquoise jewelry and intricate bead work, was surrounded by wooden swords with handles carved into animal hooves and human hands. The Hopi workers stepped back from the grave, knowing what the Moochiwimi sticks meant. This man, buried nine hundred years earlier, was a magician.
Former television journalist Kate Butler hangs on to her investigative reporting career by writing freelance magazine articles. Her research on The Magician shows he bore some European facial characteristics and physical qualities that made him different from the people who buried him. Her quest to discover The Magician’s origin carries her back to a time when the high desert world was shattered by the birth of a volcano and into the present-day dangers of archeological looting where black market sales of antiquities can lead to murder.
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Anne Montgomery’s novels can be found wherever books are sold.
Author Anne Montgomery 