Together,
the Ride Goes Faster
Carole Fuller, director
of strategic marketing in College Relations, began carpooling
this fall when Smith joined the , which offers a carpool matching
service. She writes about the experience for the
Gate.
Carpooling partners (left to right) Pam Lester, Carole
Fuller and Deb Letourneau. |
By Carole Fuller
It’s cold and a little dark at 7:45 a.m. in the Greenfield
armory parking lot. Within minutes, three cars swing into
spaces. It takes a few minutes to transfer gym bags, briefcases,
purses and lunch bags into the designated “car of the
day,” but soon the 25-minute ride to Northampton is
under way.
Our trio has been carpooling
from Greenfield to Smith for about six weeks: Pam Lester,
marketing specialist in the Smith Executive Education program,
hails from Gill; Deb Letourneau, a longtime Smith employee
now in the Office of Admission, is from Montague Center;
and Carole Fuller, who works in College Relations, lives
in Greenfield.
A carpooling arrangement among
three people with distinct schedules is a surprisingly
tough thing to coordinate, we have found. Deb takes classes
and has duties in Admission that vary her departure times
from the office. I have activities that occasionally change
my commute for three to four days at a time. And during the
growing season, Pam, a member of Community Supported Agriculture
(CSA), picks up her weekly allocation of produce from The
Food Bank's farm store in Hadley.
Still, it’s working
for us.
Although each of
us had thought about carpooling for some time—particularly
as gas prices shot up—we
found it difficult to locate rides until recently, when Smith
joined the , which offers a free
carpool matching service. Within a few hours after Smith
promoted the program to the college community, we found
one another and were emailing to see if we could create
a working arrangement.
I know for many people,
the ride to work is the only “private” time
they have all day. But by riding together,
we discovered we have things in common, and the trip seems
to go faster with conversation. We are also comfortable
being quiet, especially in the mornings.
“I work with a lot of
deadlines and details,” says
Deb, “and not having to drive all the time removes
a little of that stress from my day. It’s nice to know
I can just ride along for a third of the trips.”
Pam gets pride points
for a morning workout at the Greenfield YMCA well before
7:45, and the Yankee thrift demonstrated in her tips on
all sorts of bargains. Deb’s
day extends on the other end with early evening classes whose
discussions often find their way into travel conversations.
All three of us are gardeners, cooks, and food preservers,
so growing tips and recipes enter the conversation, as does
talk about what’s happening at Smith.
There’s never any money
exchanged because it’s too complicated with
the shifting schedules. Instead, we decide who is driving
during the next week and what days we are on our own. We
trust that it all evens out over time, and no one has
to feel stressed because their schedule changes and they
can’t
be the driver.
It helps to have three
mature women who can organize projects —and,
importantly, who have a great sense of humor.
|
