Kerry Goode

Goodbye, Pearl My heart is still somewhere out in that driveway, laid out flat like it just got the Holy Ghost and passed clean out. Today, I had to say goodbye to Pearl. Now Pearl wasn’t just an SUV. Pearl was my last rolling piece of freedom. She was my pre-ALS independence sitting on four tires. She was my “I’ll be right back” machine. My “let me run to the store” chariot. My “I don’t need nobody to take me nowhere” declaration with leather seats and a clean paint job. And today… she left me on the back of a tow truck like she was being taken to glory. That hurt. The last time I sat behind Pearl’s steering wheel, ALS made something painfully clear. I was sitting at a red light, needing to make a simple right turn. Simple for everybody else. But my arms said, “Oh no, we don’t do that anymore.” Cars behind me started blowing their horns like they were in the Indy 500 and I was holding up qualifying. I’m sitting there sweating, praying, negotiating with my limbs like, “C’mon y’all, just one more turn. ONE.” I wanted to yell, “Y’all better be glad I can’t get out this truck!” But truth was, I was scared. For the first time in my life, I knew I was not safe behind that wheel. Somehow, I used my legs to help force that turn, then drove home with fear sitting in the passenger seat. When I pulled into the driveway and climbed down out of Pearl, I knew. That was it. I dragged myself into the house and told Tanja my heart was broken. I wasn’t just giving up driving. I was giving up another piece of the man I used to be. So Pearl sat in the driveway for ten years, looking like a museum exhibit titled, “Before ALS Had the Nerve.” My girls used her sparingly—very sparingly after Sydney forgot to stop at a stop sign and introduced Pearl’s front bumper to somebody else’s rear end. After that, Pearl went into semi-retirement. Family members would ask, “Can I borrow the truck?” And I’d be sitting there thinking, “Borrow? That’s Pearl. That’s not a truck. That’s family.” But Pearl started coming back with scratches nobody knew about, “Not me.” “Wasn’t there before.” “I don’t remember.” And don’t get me started on the gas tank. I’d hand her over full, she’d come back thirstier than a man in the desert. Apparently, Pearl had been traveling with witnesses who all suffered from sudden memory loss. So today… I kissed her goodbye. Literally. Leaned in, pressed my forehead to hers, and whispered, “Thank you.” Watching her get winched up onto that tow truck felt like watching my past drive away without even turning around to wave. And when that tow truck pulled away, I laughed a little. Then I hurt a lot. Because sometimes letting go isn’t about the thing itself. It’s about what that thing represented. Pearl was freedom. Pearl was strength. Pearl was before. But even as she rolled away, I reminded myself: ALS may have taken the keys, but it never took my memories. It never took my gratitude. And it sure didn’t take my ability to laugh through tears. So goodbye, Pearl. You were loved. You were loyal. And Lord knows… you were patient with my family. Now let me go sit down before I start ugly crying like Tanja did over that Mercedes.

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