waiting room chairs

I was sitting in my SUV the other day, waiting for my husband who ran in to get something at Target. No one, not even husbands, can ‘just run in’ to Target. It’s getting nearly as bad as IKEA. Men will deny it, but inevitably something will catch their eye, like a barbeque or a Nerf gun, and forty-five minutes later the truck is almost out of gas, and I haven’t even left the parking lot. Anyways, I entertained myself by flipping through a magazine I found on the floor when it suddenly occurred to me, my mom car is just like a waiting room.

There are all manner of reading materials to choose from. Unopened mail I have been piling up for months I could finally take a gander at, magazines I don’t even subscribe to littering the floor space, kid’s paperwork sent home from school which didn’t even make it into the house. Oh gracious me…there was a fair last month! Looks like it would have been fun! Too bad I didn’t see the flyer in the five hundred other pieces of paper my kid got sent home with that day.

Not only reading material is available in my vehicle, but also snacks and plenty to drink. There are at least twenty barely-sipped water bottles lying around, almost enough to repackage as a 24-pack. I’ll just wait til tomorrow. There are sandwich bags filled with goldfish crackers, slightly melted gummy bears, and trail mix. There are perfectly acceptable containers of french fries, and I spotted a barely crumpled bag of Doritos stuffed between the seats, enough food to keep me from starving should my husband stay inside Target for a week or more.

If I get bored from the reading material, I’m sure Buzz Lightyear will cheer me up, or perhaps the 20 tiny, fuzz-covered Squinkies I buy for a quarter each at the local grocery store, which immediately fall into the seatbelt holes and are consequently forgotten. Not to mention the McDonald’s toys that broke when my kids opened the bags. If that’s not enough, the coloring books and markers from the last road trip are still in the seatback pocket. They might do the trick, if my kids remembered to put the tops back on that is. If I’m really lucky, I’ll find one or two of my own paperbacks crammed beneath the passenger seat or in the side console.

Maybe I’ll feel productive while I wait and pull out a pen and some paper. Maybe write up a to-do list or write this article, I don’t know. There are at least a dozen pens scattered throughout the vehicle. Some might have leaked a little onto the carpeted floor, but really, the pen stains are the least of my worries. My daughter has puked on that carpet at least four times, so what’s a little pen ink?

If I keep the AC on, it’s perfectly comfortable in there, almost like a windy day or a hurricane depending on the level of airflow selected. I can even recline the seatback into a multitude of comfy positions and soak in the sunrays through the windshield—comfort and tanning! Show me a waiting room that can do that! Relaxing into the soothing smell of the five air fresheners hanging from the rearview, basically as good as any Sentsy. Maybe some of them don’t smell as much anymore, but if I put my nose real close to the Hawaiian Breeze one, I will actually feel like I’m on the beach with a Pina Colada. I’ll just close my eyes and lift up this warm, flat sprite from two days ago and dream.

And look at that! I think there is a candy cane in here from last Christmas! That will really get me into Christmas in July.

I can even play my own music. Whatever I want! Come on Meghan Trainor, Katy Perry, Taylor Swift and Kanye! Not in that order, Taylor and Kanye can’t be played back to back. He might take credit for the fact I was just jiving in my seat to ‘Shake It Off’. It’s not like I’m not terribly fond of waiting room music. I mean Mozart’s Requiem transcends all else, but I can’t quite hear it over the news channel in the corner of the waiting room of my doctor’s office.

I can close my eyes and not worry about awkward/creepy stares from other attendants, or other people’s children screaming in my ear (my own do that perfectly well, thank you), or bumping into my knees, or stepping on my foot…so really my mom car is better than a waiting room.

Next time I go to the doctor’s office, I’ll sign in and tell them to shoot me a text when it’s my turn, and then head back out to my car to wait.

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Katie Rosa

Katie Rosa is a writer, a former probation officer, The Tamer of The Rose, and mother to Jocelyn and Liam. She thinks her writing is hilarious but really it’s only mildly amusing and sometimes borderline offensive. Still, she giggles madly to herself while writing, so she can’t stop. She loves referring to herself in the third person because that makes her feel like a character in a story. Author of A Rowboat Out of Sand, available on amazon. Check out her website for more info about her books and other writings.

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