Day 1
Wednesday
July 15th, 2009
There’s
nothing more spectacular than feeling the push in a driver’s seat of a 1983
Firebird with windows down, air rustling my thick beard, while the car shakes
with its intense 90 horsepower. Okay, perhaps intense isn’t quite the word I’m
looking for. Hey, I paid only $600 for the beast, so I can’t complain too much.
It’s the perfect vehicle for moving across the country with. Don’t worry, it’ll
make it. Not many of my family sees it the way I do. They may be a little skeptical
due to the fact that last few months I’ve had starting problems with her.
There’s also the fact that I accidently tightened the throttle bolt too much,
successfully breaking it. However, that is why they invented JBWeld. The
starting issues – well I replaced all the alternator wires, they had been
jerry-rigged by its previous owner, with brand new ones I got from the auto
store. I also took out the new back speaker and electrical taped the wire where
my brother drilled through and into the metal frame.
I’m all set. This trip will go
fine. After all I only have 3,000 miles to drive to reach my destination. See,
here’s the thing, I’m moving from my home in Washington (the state) to
Mississippi. Why Mississippi you ask? Well, I’d like to get away from the stress
of my ex and her family. See, I’ve gained full custody of my 11 month old son,
and I cannot afford to pay my attorney. I simply don’t make enough money.
Therefore, I convinced my attorney to come with me to court for one last
hearing. I obtained an order of relocation to Mississippi. My father lives
there as a pipefitter, and is willing to help me get a job. With no bills, I
will be able to pay my attorney and finalize my custody and divorce. How did a
man obtain full custody? Why, my ravishing good looks obviously.
I never knew they made a
four-cylinder firebird, but that’s what I ended up with. My son is in the back,
strapped in his car seat, and my friend Mickey is driving since the last truck
stop. I hear the static of my name in the hand held CB radio at my side.
“What’s up?” I ask into the
receiver.
The radio worked well up until
now as we neared dead man’s pass in Oregon. Now static floods it with each word
spoken, making both Mike and Daniel in the van behind us, very hard to hear.
“The van is,” the receiver
fuzzes and crackles a little, “Overheating. We need to pull over.” Daniel’s
voice cracked.
“Crap,” I say. “Alright Mickey,
keep an eye out for the next exit.”
I begin to wonder if paying $300
for the Chevy Astro van was too good to be true. With less than $1000 I had
brought two vehicles to bring me 3,000 miles south. No wonder my family didn’t
think I could make it, right? The next exit doesn’t come for miles, and by the
time I see it, I realize in my rearview mirror that I can no longer see the
van.
Dead man’s pass in Oregon is a
terrain full of hills and nothing. Central Oregon is a desert, not a desert
like those you see in old Westerns with cacti everywhere and rock formations.
The desert in Oregon is full of hills, flat terrain, and sagebrush as far as
the eye can see. The road is narrow and there are no shoulders anywhere.
Therefore there aren’t any stops for miles. When I finally find an exit I headed
straight off. However, we could find no trace of the van through the hills. The
road came to a fork and a bridge that went back over the interstate on the
left. We pulled straight ahead and parked by the grass. Mickey exited the
firebird with the handheld CB and dashed towards the bridge.
I stepped out of the vehicle and
stretched when a foul scent slapped my nose in crinkles. I pulled up the seat
to find my son laughing as he played with his own excrement. My eyes bulged in
disgust as I furiously searched for the wipes.
“Stop.” I half yelled.
I began cleaning his hands first when I
noticed that his entire car seat was covered as well as the backseat and back
of the front. I held in the regurgitation that I felt as I cleaned everything
with the handful of wipes in my hands. I had to clean his face, arms and legs
as well. It took me nearly fifteen minutes to get everything in order and
change his diaper with a fresh one.
I
looked around and noticed that we really were in the middle of nowhere. While
we were on an exit on dead man’s pass, it seemed to be more of one for scenery,
and perhaps a few tourist attractions, although we were the only ones on the
exit. There didn’t seem to be any sort of business for miles around on either
side and so I had nowhere to keep the diaper and collection of wipes I had
amassed. I secured them all in a plastic bag and looked around trying to find
any sign of intelligent life. All around me I saw trash through the tall tan
grass, and so after making one last check I tossed the bag with wipes and
diaper out into the wilderness. Normally, I am not one to litter, in fact I
despise it, but I knew there were no such exits for miles over dead man’s pass
and we couldn’t travel with the foul scent for long without growing daftly
sick.
I
pulled my son out of the car and walked with him towards the interstate where
Mickey stood on the bridge just over it, searching out to find the van. The CB
radios had been such a great idea when we headed out, and I was so happy to
install the one in the van and get the handheld one from my brother, but now
the communication seemed interrupted by the vast hills over dead man’s pass. I
only hoped after we crossed the dreary hills the communication would continue
Mickey
stood on the bridge, wearing his white t-shirt and light blue gym shorts,
staring off west on I-84 and yelling into the handheld CB. Mickey is a heftier
man, not fat, but linebacker built, and a good friend of mine for many years.
His father and my mother used to date a long time ago. We had become good
friends, but had a really bad falling out for years. Sometimes, it is hard to
forgive for some things, but we are always taught we must. We had grown close
again over the last few years that I’ve been back in Washington.
“Can
you get anything from them?” I asked.
“No,
this damn CB isn’t working worth a crap,” he said.
We
stared off into the west and looked for the van. It shouldn’t be hard to miss;
there aren’t many Chevy Astro vans on the road. It used to have a spoiler on it
when I bought it, but my brother nagged me that it looked ghetto and so I had
taken it off. Thinking about it now, I wish I would have left the stupid thing
on, after all, it would have made finding the van so much easier through the
vast amount of vehicles on the road.
Static
overwhelmed the radio with a few sputters of broken words. We both leapt with
excitement to use the CB radio. “Can you hear us?” We both yelled into the CB.
Nothing responded besides a constant flow of static.
After
a few minutes we finally noticed the van traveling slower in the right lane. We
jumped up and down, frantically waving our arms like idiots from some random
parade, and watched in bewilderment as the van passed us by. We both jumped
into the firebird, secured my son in the back seat, and sped ahead towards the
interstate, well sped ahead as fast as the 90 horsepower firebird would allow.
The van stopped on the shoulder just before the exit onto the freeway when they
finally saw us. I pulled over on the left side of the on ramp and got my son
and walked over to them.
Daniel
leapt out of the van towards us, followed by Mike a few minutes later. Daniel
has been my best friend for years, in fact his grandmother used to babysit me
when I was a child and before he was born. I’ve actually held him as a baby
when I was about 4 or 5. Since then we’ve pretty much been inseparable. He’s
moved away to California for a few years, but during that same time I was
living in Utah with my mother. When we both came back, we were still best of
friends. We only had one falling out, just before my mom went to the hospital
for her stroke, and of course as all manly problems, it was over a girl. Stupid
stuff.
He
came over, looking back at Mike with irritation. He stands only inches short of
me with medium length dirty blond hair. Only months ago he had his hair grow
out to his shoulder and kept it died either black or dark red. Randomly after a
year of having long hair he decided to cut it back down to its normal length
and color. He is very noticeable with dark brown eyebrows, long eyelashes,
crooked chin, and mole just above his left eyebrow that has been his birthmark.
“What
the hell happened?” I asked.
“Dude
I told you to pull over. We were overheating badly.” Daniel said. Frustration
stained his voice with a lash towards me. He expected me to know exactly what
he was talking about.
“I
heard something like that. I was looking for the next exit to pull off on. I
didn’t know how bad it was. This stupid CB radio isn’t working worth a crap,
after you yelled that into it, it began to static up and we couldn’t get much
for information out of it.”
I
shook the CB radio in my hand and turned the stupid thing off.
“So
what happened? What did you guys do?” I asked.
“We
pulled over and sat, waited for it to cool down. Mike took off his shirt,
attempting to scare everybody away from us, no doubt. Then we checked the
radiator to find it bone dry and so we had to put water in it. All the damn
water gallons are in your car so we had to sit there and pour all the water
bottles into the radiator.” Daniel said.
“Well,
crap.” I said.
I
thought hard, my mind relapsing, trying to remember where the water jugs were.
I could have sworn I put them in the back of the van, but it seems I was
mistaken. I walked over to the Firebird while both Daniel and Mike took out
cigarettes to begin smoking after their stressful experience. I told them there
was no smoking allowed in my vehicles. Mike tried to fight me on it, the steady
smoker that he is, saying that since my son was in the firebird with me that
there was no reason he couldn’t smoke in the van. I shut him up real quick,
telling him that my son’s clothes were all packed in the van, and they were not
going to smell like smoke.
I
opened the trunk of the firebird, something I’ve only been able to do recently,
within the last month before I moved I took my firebird to a locksmith and had
a door key made. When I purchased the vechicle it only came with the ignition
key. A door key seemed useless; after all, the key hole on the driver’s side
had been ripped out where someone had tried to steal it from a previous owner.
The passenger door still had one intact, but the main reason I wanted one was
for the trunk. Being a Firebird from 1983, I searched all over the sucker for a
trunk release, but found none. I had grown tired of crawling from the backseat
to put anything in the trunk. Another great thing I found out when I finally
got a key to open the hatchback, was a small box on the side that needed the
key as well, and I could open it up and put small items in there. I kept tools
that we may need for the vehicles if we were to break down on the road.
I
searched everywhere in the trunk, as well as the backseat, searching for the
jugs of water that I knew I had packed somewhere. They were nowhere to be
found, and the only water I came across was our own pack of water bottles.
“What
are you looking for?” Mickey asked. He scratched at his stubble of beard as he
watched me. His appearance was much more relaxed now that we were all reunited.
“The
gallons of water.” I said.
“I
packed them in the back of the van.” Mickey said.
He
spoke with such casualness, not realizing that Daniel had claimed to not find
them within the van. I smirked as I looked at him and shook my head.
I
strode back over to the van and opened up the back doors. Now, the van is in
pretty decent shape, but the man I bought it from said he taught all of his
kids how to drive with it. Therefore, it was beaten up, not quite as much as
the firebird on its driver’s side, but still, the back doors were the worst.
You could not simply pull the latch for it to open. Instead, you must hit the opposite
door at the same time as pulling the latch. Once open I searched in the back
for the water. It did not take me long before I pulled out 3 gallons of water
and lined them up behind the van. Daniel walked up with a cigarette in his
mouth and blankly stared at the three gallons of water in disbelief.
“You
dumbass, the water was in the back of the van the whole time,” I said.
Instead
of finding the water, they had used all the water bottles that were to keep them
from dehydration on the road. He shook his head at me and down at the jugs.
“Son
of a bitch, oh well.”
I
handed him a jug of water which he took in the hand opposite holding a
cigarette and strode off to the front of the van. He opened the hood and topped
off the radiator while the rest of us conversed by the firebird. After Daniel
finished, he closed the hood and walked over to us, we were enjoying the break
before heading back out on the road. After about ten minutes of relaxing and
talking, we saw a black and white sheriff pull off the interstate behind the
van.
“Crap
a cop.” Mickey said.
Mickey
appeared afraid; he hadn’t had much experience dealing with cops. I don’t care
much for cops either, especially traffic cops that seem to only care about writing
enough tickets to meet their deadlines, and keep their job. However, I learned
a long time ago there is no reason to be afraid if you’re doing nothing wrong.
You have to show confidence that everything is normal.
“Someone
should go talk to him,” Mike said.
I
turned to him, and noticed the fear in his eyes as well. He always was a wimp
when it came to any type of authority, my mom used to always call him a baby
back when they dated. Any time something important had to be done, she was the
one stuck doing it. I think that was always one of the reasons I hadn’t cared
for Mike during my time growing up. He never took responsibility, instead he
hid behind others. His lack of ambition was another thing that got to me. After
40 years of working and he still worked as a janitor, without any desire to
further himself in life. I shook my head and walked towards the van.
“I
got this,” I said.
I
walked down to the sheriff’s car parked behind the van as he was getting out.
He stepped towards me, clad in brown uniform with short brown hair, clean-cut
shave and sunglasses. “Is there a problem here?”
“No
officer, everything is fine. Our van overheated climbing these hills. We had to
pull over to fill it with water, and now we’re just waiting for it to cool down
before we continue.” I said with even speech and eyes looking directly at him
with confidence.
“Alright,”
he said. He took another good look at the van and back to the three others
standing by the firebird talking before he got back into his car and waited.
I
walked back over to the firebird where everybody still cowered. Daniel didn’t
seem as uncomfortable as the other two, but it still irritated me that I had to
be the responsible one and deal with any issues that arose. We talked for a few
minutes, asking what the cop had said, and what we talked about. They were
impressed with how easily I handled the situation. After another few minutes
the sheriff left, probably after first scanning my license plate and checking
that I didn’t have a stolen vehicle with me.
Another
few minutes passed of us standing around talking before heading back onto the road
with a white Subaru pull off the shoulder of the interstate in front of the
van. I inhaled and blew out a deep breath as I wondered who was to come next. A
man in his thirties got out and walked over to us.
“Is
everything okay here, do you guys need any help?”
I
took another breath, knowing I would be the one doing the talking again, and
walked up to him. Everything is fine. Our van overheated climbing these hills
and it needed to cool down and we had to fill it with some water.”
“Do
you guys need any water? I always carry plenty of extra when we go on road
trips.”
I
looked over to his car where I noticed a woman in the passenger seat and at
least one kid in the back. It was quite nice having a civilian genuinely
concerned for us. I forgot how friendly people were in the northwestern states
after spending four years in Utah where people will drive around you when
broken down. I smiled at the thought that there indeed were still good people
in the world. I figured we had enough water to survive, but I accepted his
hospitality to be safe.
“Sure,
we could use some if you have extra to spare. We just need to make it to the
next town so we can try and figure why it’s overheating.”
Mike
walked up now and began talking with the gentleman, sharing some pointless
stories. After a while, Mike asked, “How much longer until we’re off this
mountain range?”
“Not
too much longer, probably less than an hour until you’re going steadily
downhill,” the man said.
Downhill,
how wonderful that would be, both for the overheating van not having to work as
hard, and for the 90 horsepower Firebird. My measly four-cylinder car had a
tough time keeping speed up the hills, and I eagerly awaited being able to go a
decently speed by going downhill.
He
went to his car and brought us back a gallon and water.
“Thanks
for everything,” we told him. I made sure to shake his hand and wish him well
on his trip, and he did likewise for us.
After
he left we got back in our vehicles and dared head out. I drove the Firebird
instead, and steadily brought us up to speed instead of trying to floor the
slow beast as Mickey had tried. I knew it wouldn’t climb the mountains very
well unless I eased it through.
Soon
we arrived near the top of Dead man’s pass during evening at a rest stop. We
took the exit and decided to rest for a while before continuing on. Besides, I
knew both Daniel and Mike would be itching for another cigarette. We got out of
the vehicles and went up to the benches where we smoked and rested. My son took
to walking around in the grass and playing. Everybody made sure to use the
restroom before we decided to leave, and I sat with my son by the sidewalk and
table, watching in amazement as he made several piles of stones that he grabbed
and put onto the sidewalk. I let him continue to make piles until we left. He
stacked them up with precision that reminded me of the stacked rocks you often
see on TV from south America or wherever.
Before
we headed out, I called my dad and stepmom on my little prepaid cell phone and
let them know of our progress. They were the ones who lived in Mississippi that
I was moving down with. My father worked as a pipefitter for a shipyard and
told me he would help me get a job. That way I would be able to pay my attorney
back more efficiently and finalize my divorce and custody. Before I left he
sent me his Chevron card in able to get gas along the way, without it we
wouldn’t have made it very far with my lack on income.
We
went back on the road and after a while we were getting close to the end of
Oregon. However, we were getting low on gas and needed some soon. All we could
find was a Love’s truck stop, without a Chevron in sight. We decided to pull
over and see if they knew where any Chevrons were in the area.
Mickey
appeared very tired from driving, Mike really hadn’t driven very far, and Mike
was so skeptical of Daniel driving with only a permit that he didn’t really
have the chance to drive at all. So instead, the long journey had been by both
Mickey and I. It neared around eleven in
the evening, and already much longer a journey than it should have been.
Normally from Portland to Salt Lake City should take anywhere from 14-16 hours.
However, we had been on the road since nine in the morning, making our journey
already last 14 hours and we still hadn’t left Oregon yet. Mike wanted to take
so many breaks, both to smoke, and a few couple hour breaks in towns before
dead man’s pass. It made me frustrated, because I knew that all those breaks
would do, even though they were great at the time, would make us more tired
nearing the end of the journey.
Mickey
went inside to use the restroom and I followed soon after to ask the clerk
about any Chevrons in the area. I left my son in the Firebird with Daniel who
had been riding with me.
“Are
there any Chevron’s around here?” I asked the cashier.
A
big-boned woman with short dark brown hair studied me for a moment. “There’s
one in town, but it’s not that close to here.”
“I’m
on a long road trip, and I only have a Chevron card for gas, how far way is
it?” I asked.
“I
don’t know exactly where it is,” she admitted, “I’m not sure if it’s still
open; it might have closed for the night.”
“Hmm…
alright.” I said, and walked around the store checking out the souvenirs.
After
browsing around I went back to the counter and bought a 5-hour energy shot. I
didn’t want it for myself, but I knew that Mickey liked to use them, and since
I knew that he would be the one driving pretty much the rest of the way, I
decided to get one for him. Strangely enough, even though I didn’t really get
much of a break from driving yet, I was pumped for the journey and didn’t even
feel the need for coffee or energy drink. None of us had gotten any sleep yet,
and since this was my road trip, I was organizing the journey.
The
cashier asked a male worker about any Chevron’s open and he said that he
thought it was open for another hour. We didn’t want to arrive at a gas station
in Oregon if they were closed. Oregon isn’t like most states; in fact I believe
it is the only one that is illegal to pump your own gas. They have a person
come out and do that for you, which is nice, but at the same time it can be a
pain.
“Alright,
thank you.” I said.
I
walked outside to Mike and Daniel smoking, and Mickey sitting in the driver’s
seat of the van. Both Mike and Daniel were talking about the poor health of my
mom, and I got into a huge argument with them about it, the same argument I’ve
gotten with my family. If more people cared and spent time with her she would
be doing so much better, and they needed to remove her from the house she
stayed in. Daniel’s grandmother, once my mom’s good friend, was using her and
taking most of her money, and I knew that all that situation did was bring my
mom down. I yelled at both Mike and Daniel that I didn’t want to talk about it
anymore.
Mickey
hopped out of the van and asked if everything was alright. I told him it was
nothing and I was done talking about it. I told them about the Chevron, and how
we needed to hurry to make it in case they closed. We wanted to restrain from
using any cash on the road trip as much as we could, especially since we didn’t
really have a whole lot to spare on the long journey. My brother whom I had
worked for had shorted my check, and was supposed to put money in my account
during the trip, but somehow I doubted it.
I
looked through the backseat and found a plastic drink container and had an
idea. I used my old bloody-mary carpet knife to cut a strip off of it. I stuck
the part with the lip under my right headlight that I had broken a few months
back. It’s one of those popup lights, and as it turns out, if you sit on the
hood, while your friend Daniel hits the acceleration in a neighborhood, and you
slide over the headlight, you do end up breaking it. So that one headlight
didn’t pop up as high as the other. I pulled the plastic cup forward and duct
taped it to the car, and it seemed to keep the headlight up.
I
pulled out the atlas book and check which town we were in. My firebird had a
quarter of a tank, and I wasn’t sure if it was going to make it. We were in the
last main town of Oregon, and I figured we could make it to the first town of
Idaho. I loved the large Atlas I brought, as I had no technology or GPS, and instead
I planned the entire journey on an Atlas and had a few state maps.
I
walked over to the van and handed the 5-hour energy shot to Mickey and nodded
to him.
“I
already got one.” He said, pointing to the dash of the van where one already
sat.
I
smiled, “Well, use this when you need it later then.”
We
got back in our vehicles and headed out. We ended up making it to the Chevron
right across the border in Idaho and filling up the vehicles. The first day of
the road trip went alright, with only minor setbacks. This was going to be a
great journey.
