The Life of a Car Salesman's Wife

I never in a million years thought I'd be married to someone who works in the car business. My husband never thought he would work in the car business. In fact, 8 years ago, even 4 years ago, had you asked him where he would be working, he wouldn't say the car industry. He would have said a teacher, a cop, a secret service agent, even a plumber... not a car salesman. In fact, when you ask him what he does, he doesn't say he is a car salesman. He might say he works in sales, or that he's a manager at ______. Everyone things of car salesmen in a bad way...that they are sleazy, only out to take your money. I remember watching the movie Matilda when I was younger and her dad was a car salesman. He put sawdust in something in the cars to make them run well enough to get off of the lot. I totally had the idea that car salesmen were sleazy as well. Then I married one.

Here is what I know now...

You are going to have the sleazy people that are going to try to screw you out of one thing or another in every single aspect of your life. You have the slack nurses that just try to get through the shift and don't give you the attention or even the medical care that you need or deserve. You have the doctor that rushes through your surgery for personal reason and causes long term damage to your body. There are preachers out there that preach to you on Sundays, ask for money during the collection and end up living a VERY plush lifestyle w the money. Sometimes the occupations that you trust the most are the ones that might be lying to you or cheating you out of something. But naturally, as soon as someone starts talking to a car salesman, their guard goes up and they can even be VERY UGLY and belittling to them.

I know now that those car salesmen are out there working for their dinner, their home, their family. Each deal that they get helps them put food on the table. Generally they don't get a very big cut of the car they are selling...contrary to the buyer's belief. The actual salesman isn't the one who makes the call on the deal anyway... the manager is. But those salesmen deserve to get a paycheck just as much as the nurse, the doctor, the preacher. They don't deserve to be belittled, talked down to. Many many MANY customers will come in to a store and take up 4, 5, 6 hours of a salesman's time and walk away and never look back. They don't return salesmen's calls, they avoid them like the plague when the customer was the one that requested the information and promised to get back to them. It's rude. 

A car salesman (at least at the 2 dealerships that Alex has worked at) goes in to work between 8 and 9 in the morning. The dealership doesn't close until 8 pm (they need to stay open for the people that get off of work at 5 or 6.) They are open on weekends, most holidays. During all of these hours, these men and women are there...  trying to get a deal, a paycheck, something. If a customer shows up at 8:05 as the salesperson is leaving, and they want to look at a car, buy a car, etc, the salesperson who has been at work for 12 hours already will stay late for the deal...in hopes of a deal. There have been MULTIPLE times that Alex hasn't gotten home until 11 pm. And more times than not he gets home between 9 and 10 pm. 

As for our life right now, we wake up between 7:15 and 7:45 in the morning. Alex starts getting ready at 7:45 and is out the door no later than 8:15. We occasionally hear from him one time a day via phone. (unless there is an issue then there might be 2 phone calls and a few texts.) Usually around 8 pm I hear from him (a lot of the time it is the first time since he left the house at 8:15). At that point he generally tells me how long until he plans to leave. A great example of this would be tonight. He said this morning he would try to come home at 6ish. At 6:30 I heard from him saying that he had a few things to finish up and that he would be home in awhile. At 8:36 pm I hear from him and he states, "I have one last deal coming back. I will be home afterwards." It's 9:08 pm on a Monday night. I am 30 weeks pregnant and I haven't eaten dinner yet. This is my life.

I am not complaining. My husband loves what he does. He loves the challenge of the car business. He loves his boss. There are things he hates about it or wishes he could change but he doesn't complain. He never complains about the hours so I feel I shouldn't do that either. He works his butt off for us. When Charlotte and I were living in Charleston and he was living in Columbus, everyone would say "It'll be better when you are back together" or "It'll be nice when you and Alex live together again so that you will have help." The truth of the matter is, I had more help and more human contact in Charleston than I do here. I had friends to help me. Charlotte and I would have playdates with people. We had neighbors that talked to us and came over. We had a pool and park right down the street. The truth is, it's not easier. It's harder. But it's worth it. It's worth being a family again. It's worth seeing Alex even if it only for a little bit in the morning and an hour at night. It's worth Charlotte waking up and getting so excited that her daddy is in the bed and not just on the cell phone screen. 

While we were in the moving process, others stated that our move must be stressful for us as it was for them at the time... All I have to say to that is, you (the others I refer to in the previous sentence) have NO IDEA what we were going through as a family. For 3.5 months we were living in different states. For 3.5 months our life remained in limbo. We saw each other 3 times... 2 of those times for only 24 hours a piece. I took over the role of the mom, the dad, the housekeeper, the nanny, the secretary, the accountant, the lawncare worker, etc. I was all that Charlotte, the unborn baby inside of me, Max, and our house had. Just me. The closest members of my immediate family were 16 hours away. I was SO SO SO LUCKY to have visits from my sister, my aunt, my mom, and my dad in those months. I was even MORE LUCKY and thankful to have my mom and dad come down to Charleston and help for a few days then take Charlotte, Max and I home with them for 4 weeks. I would have gone crazy or miscarried the baby had this not happened. But the "others" have never had to deal with what I dealt with. They have never lived apart much less lived in separate states for 3.5 months. I was so offended that someone would even compare their stress with us moving to OUR stress.

I'm getting off topic and I need to feed this baby swimming around inside of me. I'm sure I will have more on these things later.

Moral of the story/point to this blog is remember that each of those salesmen deserve to make a living too. And if you are the type to keep them 2 hours late, you might be the one keeping them away from their toddler and pregnant wife at home. Food for thought.

I think I'm going to like this having my own blog :) 

Happy Monday.

This Blog

So I've had multiple blogs, I realize this. I do have my family blog that if you are reading this then you most likely follow that one as well. I have so many thoughts, things to vent about, that I would love to have a blog to vent or just have these things written down. So I created this one :)  I don't want to use the family blog for me to write about nonsense or myself. I will keep it separate... maybe bc I don't know that I will share this blog with EVERYONE I know or maybe bc I want it to be something just for me. Who knows.

So welcome to the thoughts in my head. I have no idea how often I will write in this blog. I might have weeks where I do it a few times or months where I only write once or twice. It just depends on what's going through my cranium :) Here it goes... :)