Driving is not my forte.

Most people who know me also know the intensity of my driving habits; whenever it's late and I'm not tired I'll ask Ashley if she wants to go for a drive with me. We always leave the GPS behind at the apartment and make it our goal to get back home without any help. It's a great way for us to get to know the area and is usually a lot of fun - except for when we get lost. Sometimes we drive towards downtown Raleigh, sometimes Cary. This past Friday, though, we somehow found ourselves all the way in Durham. Before we get into what happened, though, let's do a review on the things I've hit with my car since I received it two years ago:

• a parked car at school
• yellow pole at McDonalds
• cement parking block 
• multiple curbs
• metal basketball pole
• steel mailbox
• flower pot holder

I'm pretty sure that's it. But even if I forgot something you get the idea. So Ashley and I head off towards Cary; we've been talking and listening to music for a while when I decide it's time to go back. Unfortunately we don't recognize anything around us like we usually do, but we're not worried because we always find our way back somehow.

As we're driving along I look to my right and my eyes widen.

Me: Ashley, we've been here before.
Ashley: What? No we haven't.
Me: Yeah, we have. I've passed that sign before and I've driven on this road earlier tonight.
Ashley: Are you sure?
Me: Yeah, look - there's Lowes.. again.. and we're on Maynard for the second time.
Ashley: Shit!

So we keep driving and take a different way, knowing that this time it'll lead us right back home to Wolf Creek. Then I start looking around again and I feel like I'm in the Twilight Zone. My mind goes back to when I was a kid and I watched that one episode of Twilight Zone where the Army battleship has that evil Commander who kills innocent people; but for some reason he and everyone else on the boat couldn't escape.. no matter where they went they always ended up back on the boat. At the end they found out they were in hell for killing so many people and now they're stuck on that boat for eternity.

So when we found ourselves back at Maynard yet again, I told Ashley we were doomed to drive around forever until we ran out of gas, and that when we try to buy gas we'd get shot. I don't think she appreciated this scenario as she tried to calm me and herself down. The road we are currently on is completely deserted so I'm going at a fairly fast speed when I see something up ahead.

*hop* - pause- *hop* - pause- *hop*
Nope, not a rabbit. A raccoon, we think.

I scream and slam on my breaks, causing Ashley to scream just as equally (or possibly more) loud as me.

Me: AAAAHHHHHHHHH!
Ashley: AHHHHH! WHAT!?! WHAT?!?!?
Me: An animal! Over there! I almost hit it but I didn't! I think it's a possum! *points*
Ashley: That's a raccoon! Damn Ashleigh I thought you were going to hit a person or something!
Me: My bad. I didn't want to kill it!
Ashley: I didn't know what the hell was going on!

And so we keep driving, not much else we could do. Fortunately we're getting more confident that we're headed in the right direction at last. I'm jamming to some music hardcore when..

Ashley: ASHLEIGH WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!? THIS LANE ENDS!!

I look and sure enough, it's a right turn only. Before I crash into the large yellow signs at the end of the lane I take a sharp right turn into a school parking lot. My heart is pounding like crazy - this is one of many times tonight (and other times) my driving has almost ended my life or severely mangled my car. I park the car and try to calm down; when we both feel better it suddenly dawns on us how freaking creepy this parking lot is. Of course we're the only ones here, and everything is deathly quiet. Just then, the street lamp directly in front of us shut off.

We head out of there like it's no tomorrow and somehow manage to get back home; I have a feeling I won't be driving around at night for quite some time.