Yesterday I went on a mini-journey. And I don’t mean a dumb metaphoric journey like the one the Bachelorette goes on as she finds her husband she will be married to for 5 hot seconds.  I mean a real trip where I went from one location to another, and a lot of scary things happened along the way.  I drove Sean’s Wrangler to pick up my stepson Declan, his friend, and his friend’s younger sister from sleepaway camp 3.5 hrs away in remote Pennsylvania.  I had been worried about the way my own car was sounding and concerned about the lower tire pressures I had been ignoring lately, so asked if I could borrow for the long trip. A plus is that plus I do actually enjoy driving Sean’s Jeep.   It’s bright yellow with a soft top, the kind as a teenager I had always envisioned my older cool self zipping around in, my future labrador retriever with its ears flapping out the window, a surfboard sticking out the back.  There goes the most awesome lady in town, my teen self would predict people would say when they saw me.   Also, it was a manual, and I always feel so pleased with myself that I can still remember how to drive stick and only stall out occasionally.  In the summer, Sean often takes off the front doors which is a delight on our way to the beach.   This is not as much fun when you are on the highway, and to be honest, I’m not even sure if it’s legal?  Regardless, I left for remote PA in the cool yellow Wrangler with the front doors off, not really thinking about a nearly 4 hour highway drive with the loud wind whipping through the car.  I do, however, remember thinking smugly about how I was leaving early and would get there in plenty of time.  

Turns out, even in August, driving down the highway with doors off is pretty chilly and you can’t even hear music at full blast.   I was shivering and straining to hear anything except the loud roar of the motor and wind noise. At one point, about 2 and ½ hours into the trip, I got a work call about there being a huge scheduling gap in the veterinary ER coverage that evening and I couldn’t even hear or respond to anything the doctor was saying.  I’ll have to call you back! I shouted to (hopefully) someone, distracting me at just the right second to miss a crucial exit that would cost me an additional 45 minutes out of the way.  No problem, I reminded myself soothingly, you left early so you are just fine.

Less than 10 minutes later, the clutch broke. I smelled some terrible fumes and thought wow what jerk on the road is spewing that out?  The wind noise was so loud I hadn’t even heard anything happen to the car.  What I did notice suddenly was the tachometer needle shooting up and down and way too high and way too erratically, the clutch pedal went down and then did not come up, and I felt the car slow abruptly.  Oh my god, I thought, the jerk is ME.  Thankfully I was able to glide over the side and avoid an accident. But I sat there in the middle of nowhere, on the side of the highway in a jeep with the doors off, feeling as exposed as the day I was born. It was a large two-sided highway with 4 lanes in each.  There were no buildings and not a huge number of cars going in either direction.  I took a moment to feel the full weight of my panic, then started making calls.  “Help is on the way!,” a text message told me from the roadside assistance I had called, presumably written by a robot or maybe a highly specialized helper monkey who could type.  It then followed up with a second text and told me the car was being towed to a mechanic 2 hrs away!  Realizing that clearly something was amiss with the roadside assistance’s ability to locate me, I called again, desperate to hear a human voice.   After much explanation and attempting to figure out where I was on the GPS, a lady who didn’t sound like a robotor a monkey  found a mechanic less than a mile away off the highway.  

Lost in the middle of nowhere

The tow truck man who came to get me looked exactly like the tow truck driver from the original Adventures in Babysitting. If anyone remembers his name was Handsome John Pruitt you get bonus points. He was supposed to take me to the nearby garage but instead passed it by and told me he was taking me to his own garage which was “over the hill” 8 miles away. I watched as it became only forest around us and my cell service vanished. I resigned myself to becoming a head in his fridge and regretted not finishing the final episodes of Better Call Saul before my imminent demise.  Bumping along in the tow truck’s cab, I reflected, so this is how it happens, huh.  I hope there is not a lot of torture and pain prior to my death.

He did take me to his garage, and did not mutilate me, really only with the financial bent of wanting to be the one who fixed the car. There were no Ubers so a taxi service was called, driven by an old woman named Roz who smelled like a pack of Marlboros and informed me this was the second day she had felt comfortable driving after getting into an accident monday where her passenger broke her spine. Her gps did not work so I navigated the whole way.

We made it an hour and half away to the only rental agency I could find with a rentable car which I had booked with a reservation once my cell phone regained service. 

Upon arrival I was told “oh no we have no cars for you sorry, this always happens when people book online…”.

At this point Anna broke out the very real tears and revealed to the rental agent who was ZZ Top’s doppelgänger that I was totally fucked and explained my thus-far journey.  “Let me see what I can do” he said, his eyes widening in horror.  His motivation was obviously wanting to get rid of this sopping wet pile of a middle-aged sad sack out of his office.

In the background working in the office and in and out dealing with the auto shop cars was an older gentleman who resembled Santa Claus in street clothes. Like the old Miracle on 34th Street legit version. He would speak to me intermittently and was the most charming and intelligent man and somehow relieved my panic and hopelessness. I told him about my day while I waited to hear what ZZ Top could procure for me and he had appropriate reactions and cute interjections. He told me his son was 41 and “in neutral just coasting” but “thankfully no kids.” However, he said, it was “fine bc he has a grand-rabbit and a grand-cat.”

ZZ Top came back and told me they had one car and it was promised to someone else but they weren’t coming until later so he would give this car to me and figure out something else for them.  Thank you thank you I said over and over. I looked over and Santa Claus had a twinkle in his eye. Before they could change their minds I pulled out in the Lincoln Navigator waving and shouting thank you, this was the best part of a terrible day! Santa Claus called out “but how was the play Mrs. Lincoln?”

I arrived at the camp at 4pm after having been in the car since 7am with the happy prospect of then turning around and driving 3.5 hours home.  “What took you so long?” my 13 year old stepson D asked me.  I started to explain my crazy story but he interrupted and asked if we could get McDonald’s on the way home, clearly bored by my attempt to recount my events of the day.  

My take homes from my mini-journey are this:

Most people are nice and don’t want to kill you.

Wi-Fi and cell service are pretty nice/vital when you are stranded in bumblefuck.

I met the real Santa Claus and he is my guardian angel.

     Après journey