Another powerful woman showing the way

My sister, Carol, who is 16 months older than me, has certainly been a powerful woman in my life. For the first few years, I just followed her around, soaking up whatever she had to offer. Everything she learned in school, she came home and taught me so I started out ahead of the game. 

Later in life, she taught me how to go after what you want with not much more than determination on your side.

In the late 1980s, she was a single mother with less than $30 to her name, no groceries in the house, debtors knocking at her door, two rambunctious young boys and an unreliable car.

The only light at the end of the tunnel for Carol at the time was that she was starting a new job in six weeks as soon as she completed requirements for her doctorate degree in clinical psychology. After four or five arduous years of being a low- to no-income student, she was finally on the verge of becoming a full-time employed person.

She had to come up with a plan to get through the next month and a half, and she had to find a new source of income. As far as she could figure, $1,000 should get her through, but had no idea where to get it.

And she had no credit – she had filed for reorganization in debtors’ court several years earlier to pay off left-over debts from a marriage gone bad and had just recently completed that obligation. She had tapped out family and friends.

The breaking point

One afternoon, she walked out of a shopping center after picking up some small item for the kids, got in her car and nothing happened. It wouldn’t start.

“I had been stranded one too many times. I just left it there and walked home – two miles.”

She called the people she had bought the used Volvo from and told them to go get it. She didn’t want anything else to do with it. Despite having it “fixed” several times in the short time she had it, it still wasn’t running.

The next morning, she decided she had to make something happen. She couldn’t do anything else until she had money and transportation.

“I saw an ad in the paper that had a special on new cars. I called them up and told them that I was interested in buying a new car, but I didn’t have any transportation to even get there.

“What I wanted was a car that day, and I wanted $1,000 money back, and I wanted payments that I could handle. I told them I wanted to trade in the Volvo, and I didn’t have any way to go get it. I don’t know what made him do it, but the guy said ‘Well, we’ll just come get you and see what we can work out.’”

They could obviously tell that she was serious.

The last and only new car she owned was one our father negotiated for and helped finance after she graduated from college nearly 20 years earlier. Since then, a husband or family member either bought or gave her any used car she had.

“I just always thought I was going to need a man to help me get a car. I was kind of intimidated and nervous about that. I wasn’t sure I could just go buy a car on my own.”

But she knew what she wanted and it was up to her to get it.

“I told them it was the first time I had ever done this, and that I had no idea what I was doing. I just expected them not to cheat me.”

Being a powerful woman, plus audacious, closed the deal

Much to her amazement, they made a deal. But it took all day. Even though they weren’t giving rebates, she convinced them that the only way she could buy the car was if she could get the $1,000 back. 

She knew they would tack that amount onto the price of the car but figured that was as good place as any to borrow the money. If they wanted to make the sale, they’d have to give her the extra cash. They did, and she drove off in a new Toyota Tercel.

When I found myself stranded on Interstate 20 in a broken-down car 13 years later, I remembered how well Carol’s audacity had worked for her.

I called a local car dealership and asked for someone who could sell me a car. I explained my situation and told the salesman I was going to have my car towed there. I wanted an honest estimate of what it would take to repair it. I wanted a good deal on a new car if it was appropriate, and I was not interested in getting ripped off. He said he’d do me right.

I think he did. An hour and a half after their normal closing, I drove home in a brand-new Toyota Camry, thankful to my big sister for planting that seed.

(Note: Some of you know I also have another sister who is powerful and independent. But since she’s not fond of being in the spotlight, I won’t be sharing any of her stories.)