Six years ago, in June of 2009, I started out on my first solo road trip. I had planned a two-week trip to the Northwest in my little 2007 Ford Taurus without Judy - she said she didn't care much about that part of the country - and I was delighted to be able to do all the driving myself. This is the previously untold story of how close that trip came to an end before it had gotten started. Yes, even Judy has never heard the full story of all the mishaps that befell me on that fateful trip.
First of all, about a week before the start, I had a minor
fender bender, but the damage was mostly cosmetic, and I thought nothing of
it. However, I now think that it was a
harbinger of things to come.
The day I left I drove up past Chattanooga to a rest area on
I-24 and stopped for my lunch. And when
I got back in the car and turned the key, there was a click and nothing
else. Dead battery seemed the problem,
so I called AAA for a service call.
The truck came in about 45 minutes and jump-started me. I gave him a tip for his trouble, and got
back on the road.
About sixty miles up the road, in the town of Manchester,
Tennessee, I stopped for gas. When I
turned the key again, the same click resulted, so I again called Triple-A. This time the responder tested the battery
and found a dead cell. He recommended an
auto parts store in town, and I drove there after the jump start to purchase a
new battery.
Because of the two-hour delay, I had to drive the last 100
miles to my hotel in the dark, and I nearly hit not one, but two deer on the
way.
I had a late and less than satisfying dinner and went to bed
hoping for a better second day. But
before I could get through the first night, I actually rolled out of the motel
bed and hit the night stand on my way to the floor. Fortunately, it didn't render me unconscious, but it did put a
nice lump on my head. I imagine the
people in the room under my second floor accommodation were awakened by the
thump in the night.
The second day, rather than backtrack 40 miles down to the
interstate highway, I decided to take a local road, Highway 50, over to St
Louis. Forty miles into the drive, a
semi had gone off the road into a ditch, and the trailer was blocking the
entire highway. I waited about half-an-hour
for the wrecker to clear it before I finally turned around and went back the
way I came to get on a passable road.
That delay put me behind again, so I had to cut a planned combined lunch
stop and visit with friends in Kansas City.
Even so, I barely got to my motel in Sioux City. Iowa for the second
night before dark.
At this point, I was almost ready to turnaround and head
back home. I mean, how many times does
misfortune have to occur before you get the idea that God doesn't really want
you to make this trip?
Well, from that point on things started to improve, and I
had no further problems on my 15-day sojourn.
As a matter of fact, I believe I enjoyed that trip as much as any I have
ever made, and it has inspired several more trips back to Oregon, one of my
absolute favorite states to visit.
