(Originally written June 2, 2009)
Part 5 - This Is No Longer An Adventure
“This is no longer an adventure.”
-- Stephen M. Paulsen
Qindao and Tashiki were out with The Master away from the school. They always admired The Master for his insistence that the students remain a part of the world, and that he would even occasionally join them in outside activities. This evening, they were at a local bar waiting for a ban to come on stage, and sharing drinks and stories with a groups of friends who had also gathered there. The atmosphere was loud, but not overwhelming. The group was laughing at a story told by one of the people at the table. As Qindao was recovering his breath, he turned to Tashiki.
“Tell the story from last year's flood!”
The rush of memory came over Tashiki for a moment and he laughed a little to himself.
“C'mon! That's a great story!” Qindao insisted. The Master and the others raised their glasses and murmured their group insistence to hear the story.
“Ok,” Tashiki started, “I'm not as good as our friend Bozhong, but I'll give it a try.”
“Here's the story:”
A year ago, this area had a pretty major flooding incident. Most of the region was under water and roads were impassible. This is how I got caught up in it.
The Friday before the floods, I saw all the weather forecasts indicating a major rainstorm predicted for the weekend. I knew that would impact my work assignments, so I prepared myself for a busy week. I already had one thing scheduled for early Monday morning, but that was an easy one. I spent the weekend wondering what other hell the weekend would bring.
Monday rolled around and I set out at 7:00 AM, earlier than usual, for my first stop an hour away. The assignment there was insignificant. I spent an hour talking with a different contractor making sure that he had proper instructions for the job that I would take over when he was done. While there, the other more serious calls started to roll in.
Number one on the growing list, an office in the northwest part of my area had been damaged by the flooding. I finished with the contractor and drove out to meet them. By this time, it's 9:00 AM and I had to drive another hour to get there. Thing is, I was so far north by that time that I took roads out there that I normally do not take. I had no idea what was in store for me later.
I arrived at the office around 10:00 AM and surveyed the damage. Water and lightning had damaged the electrical system and fried the equipment in the office. I began repairs and replacements. By 2:00 PM, it became clear that the repairs I was trying to make would be ineffective. It was time to abandon ship and try again tomorrow with new equipment.
So, I start my journey home on my usual route. This has been good. So far, this is still an adventure.
I'm heading south and see evidence of the flooding all around me. Fields normally filled with corn are lakes with running water. Drainage ditches on the side of the road are filled to their tops and more than one car can be seen in the flooded ditches, with only the ass-end of the car visible above the waterline. This was bad.
So, I'm south of town in the farmland between crossroads on the map, and I come to my first obstacle. Barriers up on the road, Road Closed. OK, I'm thinking to myself, this is rural farmland, this can't be that hard. These Country Roads are all parallel-and-perpendicular to each other. A left turn here, a right, and another right, and I'll be on the other side of whatever minor disaster this is.
I turn left off the main road and start heading towards what I hope will be a recognizable option for continuing my journey. A little ways up the road, there's a guy out front trying to mow his lawn that had clearly gone out of control with all the rain. I stop and ask him if I can get to the other side of the roadblock. No problem, he says, go up to the next intersection, turn right, that will take you to the main north-south road, and that will get you back to the other side. Great! Thanks are said and I'm on my way. So far, this is still an adventure.
I bounce my Big Ugly Van across the barely paved Country Roads and find myself back on the state roads. Crisis averted, and I continue south towards home.
I come to the point of my journey where the road comes out of the farmland plains and into the hills. At the top of a significant valley, there's another roadblock. I stop my BUV for a moment and consider my options. This time I'm not alone.
All day I had been seeing cars that had an immediately recognizable passenger configuration: One parent driving and one child, around High School age, accompanying. All had out-of-state plates and all were heading in the same direction, towards the University. Something was going on.
One of these cars pulls up next to me, a mother and daughter, and we consider our options together. I tell them I'm going to drive down into the valley and see what's what. They agree to follow me. We get to the bridge at the bottom and there in the road are four very large, and I'm talking dump-truck-sized large, piles of dirt blocking the road. The message here is very clear: NO.
Out of State Mom and Nervous Daughter spend a moment looking at this obstacle to our progress and start considering options. I tell them that their best option is to go back the way we came and take a different route. In retrospect, I gave them bogus directions, and I don't feel proud of myself for that at all. They couldn't have gone too far wrong based on what I told them, and it turns out there were other options, but I really hope they found their way.
After giving them their directions, Out of State Mom asks if that's the route I'm going to take. I tell her that I'm going to try one more thing, but it's not for the faint of heart and I would not recommend it. Thanks and good lucks exchanged, Out of State Mom and Nervous Daughter go on their way. This is good. I helped a family in need. So far, this is till an adventure.
I head back up the hill and try one of the residential streets looking for a path around the washed out bridge. First attempt was a dead end. No problem, I'm thinking, I still have options.
I get back to the top of the hill where the roadblocks are and look at the signage. There is a detour sign, and it's pointing down another one of those barely-paved roads that run off into the woods. OK, I'm thinking, this could work, so I head into the woods.
The road comes to a “Y” intersection and I take the left. Well, it turns out to be someone's driveway. Still no problem, I'm thinking, so I start to turn my BUV around. While backing up, my left rear wheel goes WHOOMP and sinks into the mud. OK, this is a problem, but I grew up in snow, and I've lived in snow, I know about stuck. I try all my tricks. I tried low gear, gently rocking the van, even found cardboard and rocks to try and give the offending wheel something to grab on to. Nothing. All I have now is one wheel buried up to the lug nuts, and another spinning on hard gravel making that horrible smoking rubber smell. Yeah, I'm stuck.
By this time it's 3:30. My boss is still on duty, so I call him up. “Boss, I'm stuck.”
“That's why we have Fleet Management. Call them.”
OK, so I call Fleet Management.
“I'm stuck.”
“Where are you?” they ask.
I spend the next several minutes explaining to them that I really don't know exactly where I am. I give them the intersection closest to my location and the mini-township that I'm in. Fleet management keeps insisting that the intersection and directions from there lead into a different mini-township. Eventually, we agree that I am where I say I am and they assure me that they will send a tow truck. Great. This is good. So far, this is still an adventure.
By 4:30, I'm still sitting in the van, in the driveway, stuck. I call Fleet Management. “What's going on?”
“Well,” they tell me, “we're having trouble finding a tow company that can come out to get you. But, we're on it!”
OK, a minor setback, but this is how these things work. I call my girlfriend to explain to her what's going on. She asks if I want her to come get me. I tell her that I'm not even sure how to tell her how to find me, especially since she's on the wrong side of the washed out bridge.
I wait.
5:00 rolls around and the wife of the home in whose driveway I am stuck comes home. I step out to introduce myself and assure her that Help Is On The Way. She is not pleased, but accepting of the situation. Her only advice is that I be gone by the time her husband comes home at 6:00. No problem, I tell her, cuz, after all, Help Is On The Way.
Around 5:30, I'm starting to get a little anxious about this whole situation. Still no tow truck, and still no word from Fleet Management. Time to make another call.
“We found a tow company, their on their way.”
Great. Help Is On The Way and so far, this is still an adventure.
6:00 PM and I should have been home long ago. The husband comes home. I acknowledge him as he drive by my disabled BUV and he just keeps driving up to the garage area. I wait for an appropriate moment to go introduce myself, but he disappears behind the house for a few minutes.
When he returns, he goes into the garage and comes back out with a shovel and a wheelbarrow. I'm thinking to myself, this is either really good, or really, REALLY, bad. Turns out, it was neither. He wheels off and frankly, I never see him again.
I wait. I really need to pee. I venture up to the house and knock on the door. No answer. Seriously? They know I'm out here. Really? No answer? I hold it. I mean, I'm not gonna pee in their driveway just because I'm the one who had the misfortune of taking a wrong turn.
6:30 and time to call Fleet Management again.
“They can't find you.”
Well, duh, I don't even know where I am.
Fleet management gets my cell number and tells me they'll relay that to the driver. This is progress. The driver calls me and says he's been driving around for 30 minutes looking for me. We compare notes about directions and he says “I think you turned into someone's driveway.” Well, duh. I hear something like a truck and start honking my horn. There he is, coming down the driveway.
I get out to meet him, “Dude, I am so screwed.”
“No problem,” he says. He chains me up and after about 5 minutes of gentle pulling, I'm out of the mud. I sign the receipt and he's gone.
So, 7:00 PM, 12 hours into my day and I'm mobile again. This is good. So far, this is still an adventure.
So, I'm back on the road again. I'd been stuck in the mud for, what, 3-something hours? Obviously, I can't go the way I had intended, so I went back in the direction I came from and decided I was going to have to drive on the Interstate all the way to the edge of the city and go south from there.
I get back to the intersection that was my *first* detour's end point, and turn to go up to the Interstate. Coming from this direction, oddly, the detour signs are clearly visible. Yeah, that makes sense.
Up on the Interstate and making progress, and there's the detour sign indicating a US Highway that I can take back down to my original route. This is good. This is progress. And, so far, this is still an adventure.
By now, it's almost eight o'clock at night. I've been on the road for 13 hours. It's mid summer, so the sun hasn't quite gone down yet, but it's starting to fade.
I'm doing a reasonable speed down the road, and come over a small hill. I know this stretch of road, I use it occasionally when coming home from the north west rim of my service area. Lots of trees, and it's very pretty.
From the trees on the right is a flash of brown and a deer jumps in front of my van. Full on, mid-stride, one second she was nowhere, the next she was fully extended in front of my van. I had no time to react.
Thud. More than thud, it was whack. Her hear snapped around on the driver's side, and her butt and hind legs on the passenger side. Yes, she was that large, and yes she was mid stride.
I slam on the brakes and try not to panic. The deer slides, no skids, across the road. Completely across the road and comes to a stop at the end of a driveway.
So, I pull over and start breathing again. I check to see that I've not soiled myself, which I have not, and get out to see what I've done. A woman walking down the road picked up various van parts for me, as if I was going to be able to do anything with them other than put them in the cargo area.
I get out to inspect the situation. There she is, dead or dying, at the end of this house's driveway. I look up to see the family in the front yard. They were having some family play time: Mom, Dad, and four year old daughter.
Yes, I killed Bambi's Mother in front of a four year old girl.
This is no longer an adventure.
I kneel down to apologize to the doe as she was dying. The Dad tells me that there was a pond beyond the trees on the side of the road, and they had all, including the FOUR year old girl, watched the doe cross over to that side a few minutes ago to go get some water.
The Dad is understanding, and tells me he'll call the county to take care of the carcass. I tell him that I have got to get home and can't stay to file a police report or anything. I've never hit a deer before, I don't know what to do. He says that he'll take care of it.
So, I see the daughter, and she's looking at me with all the disappointment and bewilderment that a four year old girl can muster. I kneel down to talk to her, and I tell her that I am very sorry. There are a lot of deer and they're not very bright, but still I'm sorry that I did this. She just glared at me.
I'd been tacitly scolded by a four year old girl.
Back to the van and it's clear that this is a big deal. By now it's about 8:30, and the deer had wiped out my whole front end. Most importantly, both headlights were gone. Destroyed. Eliminated. Obliterated. No forward illumination. Nothing.
And I'm still 90 minutes from home.
This is definitely no longer an adventure.
Thankfully, there was enough light left to get started and get back to the part of my trip that would be somewhat lighted. By the time I was near home, it was close to 10 PM and the light had gone out. I had considered holding my lighter out the window as some sort of indication that a vehicle was in motion, but decided it was best not to draw attention to myself.
Ten PM. Home. Fifteen hours that day, for pretty much nothing.
-----
Thus endeth today's meditation. Let us meditate upon it.
“Road to Nowhere”, by The Talking Heads, written by David Byrne.
Well, we know where we're going, but we don't know where we've been
And we know what we're knowing, but we can't say what we've seen
And we're not little children, and we know what we want
And the future is certain, give us time to work it out
Yeah
We're on a road to nowhere, come on inside
We'll take that ride to nowhere, we'll take that ride
Feeling okay this morning, and you know
We're on a road to paradise, here we go, here we go
We're on a ride to nowhere, come on inside
Taking that ride to nowhere, we'll take that ride
Maybe you'll wonder where you are, I don't care
Even when time is on our side, take you there, take you there
We're on a road to nowhere, ha, ha
We're on a road to nowhere, ha, ha
We're on a road to nowhere, ha, ha, whoo
There's a city in my mind, come along and take that ride, and it's all right, baby, it's all right
And it's very far away, but it's growing day by day, and it's all right, baby, it's all right
Would you like to come along, you can help me sing this song, and it's all right, baby, it's all right
They can tell you what to do, but they'll make a fool of you, and it's all right, baby, it's all right
There's a city in my mind, come along and take that ride, and it's all right, baby, it's all right
And it's very far away, but it's growing day by day, and it's all right, baby, it's all right
Yeah, would you like to come along, you can help me sing this song, and it's all right, baby, it's all right
They can tell you what to do, oh, God, they'll make a fool of you, and it's all right, baby, it's all right
We're on a road to nowhere, hey
We're on a road to nowhere, ha
We're on a road to nowhere, ha, ha
We're on a road to nowhere
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