The Epic Adventure, or Why I Hate Driving In Winter

It was a snowball day: plans slipping from their appointed spots on the calendar, rolling into one another and taking the next and the next and the next down with them, collecting and accumuating, getting big enough to build stuff out of, or at least smack you upside the head. Intentions of going to my morning classes faded as I weighed driving into town in the snow, parking, and walking around against sitting at home, working on my thesis, and sipping coffee. You can guess which one I picked....

So after a hot lunch--no tupperware for me today--I set off for my dentist's appointment. I'd been having toothaches off and on for the last month, and a couple times so severe that I couldn't sleep even doped up on painkillers. It was snowing pretty good, so I left myself an hour and a half to go an hour's distance. The roads weren't bad most of the way, and I took the windy city route--and got lost only once--in order to avoid 93, a winding road across exposed prairie where tractor trailers frequently tip over and windy blizzards shut down the road.

Everything was fine until I hit C-470 going south, another exposed road. As soon as I passed the exit, traffic came to a complete halt, a three-lane parking lot. As I considered my options and my eighth of a tank of gas, a fire rescue vehicle edged along on the right shoulder, followed by an ambulance. Horn and sirens announced the arrival of the fire truck, which somehow expected to get past three lane parking on the left shoulder. The driver in front of me began gesticulating wildly, a physical "what do you expect me to do??" which didn't change the fact that the truck still needed to get by.

So we sat. Mindful of my limited fuel, I turned off my car and sat reading my book for about twenty minutes, listening to my music and not begrudging the time, as I was relatively ahead of schedule. And soon enough, traffic began moving again, more than five feet at a time. I turned the key.... and nothing happened. My battery was dead. Meanwhile, the cars behind me began edging around me, and I became the traffic hazard in the middle of the three lanes.

What to do? I could try rolling the car, jumping in and putting it in gear, but I was more or less on the level and in traffic--and in snow. So I get out and walk back to the car behind me, and ask him to please kindly lend me his battery so I can jump start my car. Five minutes later, I'm on my way, and arrive at my appointment only five minutes late despite the half-hour delay.

I explain to the Dr. about the toothache. He opens my mouth and peers inside:

"Oh."

?

"I shouldn't say 'oh,' I guess," he continues. "But I know what the problem is. Remember those wisdom teeth I suggested you have pulled? You have a big hole in one, and it's almost down to the nerve. Don't chew on it, or you could break it."

Oh.

Well, that just worked its way up my priorities list....

I pay my $25, take my perscription for antibiotics in case it gets infected, fill up my car, and head off up to the mountains to see the 'rents, normally a 20 minute drive through a beautiful, snow-covered canyone past icicle trees.

Traffic crawled all the way up the canyon. Apparently they didn't feel the need to plow, because the roads basically consisted of a giant pile of slush forming a small burm over the median, to dissuade you just in case you fell like passing. A semi chaining up didn't pull all the way off the road, which narrowed traffic to one lane and caused the jam. Each time I started moving again, my car would slide sideways a foot or so. Kind of like ice skating, with the potential of doing hundreds of dollars of damage if I managed to F it up. I could feel the stress creeping in, settling between my shoulder blades, increasing with each slippery patch as if someone were weighting my shoulder blades. On the inside of some of the curves, real-wheel-drive cars lay scattered like the toys of a three year old with ADD, left where they fell, unable to make it up the hills and around the corners. You pretty much needed an all terrain vehicle to make it up. In one curve, where there were already three or so cars stuck, I felt my car sliding inexorably towards the parked cars, closer closer closer.... but we pulled through. Every time I drive up there in the winter, I remember the one time which left me sitting sideways on the median after having practically impaled my car on a street sign, because I felt it necessary to pass a semi pulling a tractor.