Story time.
Last week, me and some of the kiddos headed to the beautiful city of Miami, Florida. As many people do, I plan my vacations and am really intentional about what we’re doing, where we’re staying, and of course, how we’re getting there and coming back home.
When deciding what vehicle to rent, I thought about the space for my very pregnant daughter, as well as my 6’ son needing the leg room; therefore, I’d rent us a minivan. It should be plenty spacious for us. And it was! For about an hour…
For the first time in my life, I had a tire blow out on the interstate.
We had just stopped at Buc-ee’s. {Oh, you aren’t familiar with Buc-ee’s? Well, it’s like a Walmart, and a Florida Turnpike Service/Rest area had a baby. And the baby makes really good brisket. Think, gas station, plus truck stop, plus convenient store, plus groceries, plus quick-meal restaurant. And, there’s a beaver. Or, just google it, “Buc-ee’s” and I’m not misspelling it.}
Any who… we leave this oasis of gas and beavers and continue on our adventure. Literally, 50 minutes (total) into the drive and we hear a POP. I look at the tire pressure and the back right tire’s pressure is falling faster than I’ve ever seen. It’s obvious to me we need to get over, because, of course… I’m on the left lane. We do, and the two men, my six footer and my son-in-law, hop on out to begin changing the tire. I get on the phone calling road-side assistance. As they are at the rear of the vehicle, removing all of the luggage to access the spare tire, the road-side person informs me that, that particular vehicle does not have a spare tire. The men load all the luggage back into the trunk.
We are informed that a tow-truck is 89 minutes away. It’s 4PM on a Friday, and that the local Rental Car’s location will replace our van. The local place closes at 5PM… the oblivious road-side person on the phone doesn’t see the issue. I immediately do. I know that at 5PM on a Friday that worker, at that location has one foot out of the door and is super ready to start their weekend. The roadside person on the phone deemed our call had ended and hung up on me, I quickly call the local branch who is allegedly replacing our rental. I’m informed that all they have available is a Jeep Wrangler. A Jeep Wrangler?!?! How the … there’s 5 and a half of us, and 10 pieces of luggage… and… the lady keeps insisting that I need to call the branch where I originally rented from (50 minutes away) and so, I do. In between those two calls I speak to the tow-truck operator who tells me, he’s actually only 15 minutes away. GREAT! He explains that the cab of his truck only sits 2 additional people, no luggage… he may or may not have proposed a solution, that I may or may not have agreed to. A solution, that almost brought my older son to the brink of a nervous-vomiting-situation… but more on that in a moment.
I speak to Mr. Trent at our rental place and that hero of a man said, “I got you! I’m on my way to you with a replacement minivan” WHAT?!? That man could’ve been wearing a cape that day. He was our Mighty Mouse. (For those of you with horrible childhoods, JK, Mighty Mouse’s song was, “Here I come to save the day” very applicable). Being on the side of the road, was in and of itself quite the nerve-wracking experience. For every car that got over, 10 did not. Every speeding truck made the mini-van jostle from side to side. The people I love (a TON) were with me on the side of the road, we were one distracted driver away from a really bad day. I knew that. So, imagine my relief when I see a tow-truck slow down…
The tow truck was an older model flat bed. We immediately noticed the lack of functioning break lights as it pulled in front of us. My daughter and youngest son got out of our vehicle and into the cab of the truck. While me, my son-in-law, and my nervous-nelly son remained in the van. The only way for us to not stay on the side of the interstate with all of our luggage, was to… well, remain in the van as it was taken to the next exit on the interstate (about 4 miles away) where we’d safely wait, for our replacement rental. To remain in the van meant, we’d all be going up onto the flatbed and moved to that safer spot. It also meant, we’d have to … well, hide, as this was highly frowned upon (some would even say “illegal” but…I’m not a lawyer nor am I a judge) any who, we hid.
To my surprise, Mr. Driver wasn’t going to pull it up, he intended to “drive it up there”. He tells me, while I’m still sitting in the driver’s seat waiting for a safe non-traffic moment to get out of the car, “mom, just get on over to the passenger seat” he says with all the authority I needed to hear, “oh, ok” I say in compliance. Now, I know that I’m about to stretch some parts of me that haven’t seen action in a while. I’m not a small woman, but I did it! The driver’s encouragement was welcomed as he said, “mommas got it” why yes, Mr. Tow Truck Driver, momma did in fact have it. He, then got into the car. Me, Daniel (my son-in-law) and Geo (the 20 year-old) are already sitting in the vehicle as well. Then, as if on a rehearsed que, we drop our seats to their most inclined positions and scoot as far down in those seats, as we’re able. Mr. Tow Truck Driver gave an approving nod, and proceeded to drive the mini van up onto the inclined bed. Many things crossed my mind at that point: I thought, ‘what if this heavy van causes the truck to completely flip and my kids and granddaughter are inside the truck’, and I also thought, ‘what if we roll off and into traffic’; obviously, none were comforting thoughts, but many flooded my brain. I was rudely brought back into reality when our limber driver exited the van and hopped off the inclined flatbed. I logically knew what was coming, he’d have to (right?) strap us in… right? There was some clickity, clack going on outside and then, we asked out loud, to one another, “do you think he’s going to just lift us?” “should we get out?” and then, before we knew it… the van was being lifted. I couldn’t stop laughing. That’s when I heard my son yell from the back seat, “oh my god mom, I’m going to throw up” that made me laugh even more. I took a photo of us, just because this was the most insane “tow” I’d ever been a part of. I also remember thinking, this is what people being smuggled illegally across boarders must feel like. As I heard the driver start the tow truck and slowly roll off the shoulder of the highway, my (usually not nervous) stomach lurched. Not only were we hiding inside of the minivan, on a flatbed, on an interstate… but our old tow truck without break lights was also, stick shift, a manual-transmission vehicle. We felt that truck change ALL the gears. Every. Single. One.
I couldn’t help myself and peeked out. Oh yeah, we were on a flatbed rolling down the highway. Exiting off the interstate was fun too, actually, anything that required the truck to break, turn, slow down, and/or speed up were very unique sensations. The yells from the back seat continued, of course, with every single movement we felt. When we finally arrived at the gas station, located right off the exit, the tow truck driver, without warning, lifted the flatbed to it’s very uncomfortable inclined position. When it was done, he yelled, “alright come on out of there” and we did. Our boarder crossing was complete. We removed all of our contents and luggage and waited on a sidewalk outside of the gas station. What a sight we must’ve been to any onlooker: An older lady, looking quite disheveled, a tall guy wearing headphones rubbing his stomach, a short and stocky 12 year-old boy fixated to his gaming device, a very pregnant woman adorned with a large pregnancy pillow, a man with a respectable amount of facial hair pacing, and tons of luggage. Modern-day gypsies in the beautiful Love’s gas station.
A few moments later, Trent rolled up like a boss. I believe the heaven’s opened and an extra light shown on our hero and our new chariot as they arrived. Sure, the new van wasn’t washed, but who cared! We were rescued! Of course this is Alabama so we exchanged the obligatory pleasantries, and then loaded up and headed out. The entire ordeal only added 1 hour to our GPS’s original arrival time. I was humbled and appreciative of these stranger’s attention to my family and God’s amazing provision and care throughout the series of events. We rolled out of that gas station praising God for His marvelous grace and care, and singing the praises of a very tired Trent who would now need to wait for an Uber to pick him up from a random Love’s gas station in Pell City, Alabama. We, were on the road again…
We were somewhere in south Georgia when my son-in-law who was driving says, “the car is overheating” not in a panic, just very matter-of-factly. I was riding in the back enjoying my Ms. Daisy experience, and I peek over his shoulder. Great Scott!! The car’s temperature gauge is pegged at “H” and there’s red on the display screen. Thankfully, we are near a rest area so we can safely pull in. Even though none of us are mechanically inclined we all know that we’d need the engine to cool down before we open that coolant compartment under the hood. We decide to do that. While waiting, I once again get on the phone with road-side assistance. If you can believe it, they are even more oblivious at night, especially after 11PM. Tow truck? Maybe until morning… Hotel that they’ll Uber us to? We needed to call and find one. Imagine, I’m on the phone with roadside and each adult is on their phones calling hotels looking for anything they had available. Well, everything was sold out. Who knew that Valdosta, Georgia is a Spring Break destination? I had heard of Panama City Beach and Daytona, but LOOK OUT! Valdosta is quite the hot spot. There were no hotel rooms available within a 50-mile radius. Our AirBNB was out of the “approved Uber range” for the rental company’s roadside service. Good times.
There we were, our red van, hood up and open, all of the doors of the mini van were open, a pregnant lady sprawled out in utter discomfort, the child in the back seat… still playing on his gaming device, a bearded man pacing, a tall guy pacing in the opposite direction of the bearded guy, and the older woman walking purposefully towards the bathrooms on her cell phone. We were all on edge, and tired.
Please understand, this is a rest stop off of I-75, somewhere in South Georgia about 50-ish miles away from Valdosta, Georgia, we are an hour and 20 minutes (the GPS reads) from our 1st Airbnb stop in Lake City, Florida. It’s the middle of night and while I’m on my phone, anxious and tired, that’s when I finally notice, we are not alone. This rest stop is bumpin’
I’m looking around at this point, standing under the lights of the pavilion that house the restrooms, I have the phone up to my good ear (I can barely hear anything out of the other one) and it’s quite the colorful cast of characters that are in our midst. A woman walks up to me, slurring gesturing to a man who is minding his own business and sitting on the other side of the pavilion. I nod and smile, and continue to listen to the horrific hold music that roadside assistance insists on using. The woman leaves and I think nothing of it. I do assess the situation and realize that my family are a bunch of sitting ducks. There are people who are just hanging out at the rest stop. Did you know that, that’s a thing? I surely didn’t. But, there they are. Not using bathrooms, not buying things from vending machines, not popping open the hoods of their overheating cars, no, they’re just… around. Lingering. It’s a very strange sub-culture we’ve stumbled upon. As I begin to make my way to our van, trying to appear nonchalant, when I really want to scream, “SHUT THE DOORS, LOCK EVERYTHING” I see my older son walking towards me. “What’s up” I ask. He tells me that the drunk weird lady told them that a drunk man was, “harassing me”… Ummmm, this was news to me. I think back at my thoughtless nod, ‘hmmm, I really should pay more attention to people’, I think to myself. I reassure my son that I’m fine. I make it to the van, to find a pick up truck parked close to our vehicle with what looks like 2 men sitting inside the truck. I quietly tell my daughter to shut the door of the van. She does, but then also encourages us to open the coolant compartment and see what it is that we’re working with. Her thought is that we put some water in it, and drive it to Lake City, where we can then swap out rental cars in the morning, according to the almost very unhelpful people at the roadside assistance call center.
As the three of us (G, Daniel and I) stare at what appears to be a plastic container on the top of the engine that reads, “coolant” we think about our next moves. How do we open this? Do we have rags? No. Napkins? No. A thick leather jacket to shield us from the potential spewing of hot coolant exploding all over us and the engine (I think that’s what we all thought was about to happen)? No. We have a rain jacket. Daniel is first, he covers his entire arm with the jacket and proceeds to try and turn the pressure cap. Nothing. After a few tries, I say, “let me try” BTW, I’m super scared. I wrap my right arm in the jacket and proceed to try and open it. I say out loud, “is it righty tighty, lefty loosie?” as the door of that parked truck opens. The man who steps out looks very angry. Like, he’s fed up with the entire world. I acknowledge the upset man, and once again ask, “is it guys, lefty loosie?” the angry man walks up and without saying a word, puts his hand over the pressure cap. I go to hand him the jacket, you know for his protection, he simply turns the cap… he didn’t even struggle with it as Daniel and I had, maybe we loosened it for him. That thing opened right up. EMPTY! “Damn it Trent, what kind of dud, ill-equipped peace of crap van did you bring us?! Let’s check the oil” I say… adamant that we were delivered an unkept rescue van. I try to explain to the angry man the ordeal from earlier, he walked away and went towards the bed of his truck. I thought, well… he’s either gonna shoot us, stab us, or pull out some magical item from the bed of that truck.
2 gallons of coolant. He walked right up to the car and emptied them into the coolant reservoir, “turn it on” he said in a monotone voice. I heard the words come out of my mouth before I could stop them, “the car?” I asked. What else would he be referring to, Jennifer? Daniel hopped into the driver side and turned on the vehicle. Did you know the coolant reservoir empties when you turn the car on? I had no clue. The angry guy poured the rest of the coolant in and told Daniel, “if it was me, I’d drive another 30 minutes refill it with water and keep going”. He handed Daniel the empty jugs so we could fill them with water. That’s exactly what we did.
We made it to the Lake City AirBNB at 2AM. I knew I had to wake up early to be at the local rental office when they opened at 9am to swap out the vehicles. I was just so very grateful to be safe in a bed and resting. So very grateful for the angry man that drives around South Georgia rest areas with gallons of coolant in the back of his truck.
A little before 8AM, I was up and ready to continue the adventure. Daniel and G checked the coolant level before I headed to the rental location, it was empty. We filled it with water, and I went off. I got to the Lake City location just after 9AM. G and I stared at the once-deemed-rescue-chariot parked at the rental lot pouring liquid out of its nether regions. It must be a cracked radiator or something, Geo said. Whatever it was, it wasn’t going to make it to Miami. Regardless what the people at roadside said, the local rental dealership did not have a minivan to give us, we’d be in a smaller SUV for the rest of the trip. I told the guy working there that I just need the vehicle to be in good condition. He did the best he could with what was on the lot.
We were given a replacement vehicle at about 11AM-ish. A Jeep Cherokee.
We drove south in that baby and ended up having an amazing vacation. But… the journey down is something I don’t believe any of us could ever forget. Well, except the 12-year-old that is: I don’t think he even knew what all was going on. He just always knew that we’d take care of it.
Sometimes the journey is difficult and riddled with challenges. The destination though, was awesome!