Dear Mobility Van,

You are the bane of my existence, the mean girls to my Lindsay Lohan character, the Gargamel to my Smurfs. What I’m getting at here is that there’d be no show without you, but wow do you suck.

To be fair, it’s not just you. It’s the entire company we bought you from: Mobility Works. They have mastered neither customer service nor maintenance, and they appear to be confused by social media.

Your door has been broken for many months now, but Mobility Works claims that only half of the door is covered under their warranty, and the rest is Honda’s problem. So, as though following some weird suggestion by a modern day King Solomon of car parts, they fixed only the bottom of your door. We called Honda to see about getting the top part fixed. You know, so the door would work. Honda said they would need the car for at least 2 to 3 days to fix the problem. Mobility van, as much as I dislike you, I do recognize that I can’t spend 2 to 3 days without you. So the door continues to need a manual push. But isn’t it great that the bottom part is fixed??

Then you really outdid yourself on Saturday, right as we were headed out to Scarlett’s first basketball game. Your door slid open beautifully. No problem there. But when it came time for the ramp to fold down…nothing. Not even a squeak or a rumble to let us know you were trying. Evidently you’ve gone on strike, without detailing your terms. Although if they involve having fewer rice cake crumbs and less yogurt splatter on the floor, I would almost understand your position.

Rob tried in vain to pull the ramp down. He opened and closed the door 10 times. In the end, I had to tell him to rush Scarlett to the basketball game in his car, while I rolled back into the house and cried. That’s right, I missed my daughter’s first basketball game, and you made me cry. I hope you’re proud of yourself, you 4-wheeled Machiavellian machine.

So instead of watching five and six-year-olds attempt to dribble a basketball in a four on four configuration, I spent my time on the phone trying to get a hold of someone at the 24/7 emergency Mobility Works hotline. That didn’t go so well. The emergency number routed me to a closed office in Farmingdale, Connecticut, which then sent me to a voicemail box in Long Branch, New Jersey. I left a message. Not long after, a nice but confused man called me back. He didn’t appear to be part of the emergency hotline, but he did tell me that there were manual fixes for a stuck ramp. I thanked him, feeling lucky that the problem would be solved before we left for Tahoe the following day.

But, mobility van, you had other ideas. No matter what we tried, including reading your manual, the ramp remained fixed in place and would absolutely under no circumstances fold out. We called the 24-hour hotline. ALL MORNING. No one called back, not even my friend from Long Branch.

We are really lucky that we had another option for travel, although it’s not one I’m incredibly happy about. Rob loaded up his station wagon with all of our bags and my travel wheelchair. The travel chair is fine, but it’s definitely a backup plan you hope to avoid, especially if your vacation consists of sitting in a hotel room with a book while your family skis.

Mobility Works finally got back to us this morning, by which point I had already made an appointment to bring you in to be fixed (and maybe lobotomized) at our local Mobility Works office. Their technician is out, so they could only assure me that it’s possible your ramp will work again sometime this week. Unless, of course, they determine that this is Honda’s fault, in which case we will be redirected and I will ask whomever’s driving you to aim directly for the nearest brick wall.

Love,
Sarah

P.S.  I really hope you can’t read. I’m aware this could get worse.

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