April, 2002

It's almost too trite to say, but life is made up of and depends upon the slightness of chance. On the other hand, triteness comes from the constancy of truths and so, we are stuck with it.

We were returning to the mountains from a strenuous day in Prague, meeting friends at the airport, just in from Montreal, a series of business meetings and then dinner with friends, including a rather late night at Alan Ward's flat. Due to the arrival time of the flight and our distance from Prague, we'd roused ourselves at 5:30, no matter we'd not been to bed until nearly three. Dog tired on the way home, 1:30 AM and raining slightly, doing an effortless 80MPH on what serves here as an Interstate, remarking on how well the car was running, I was fueled by a can of cappuccino picked up when we stopped for gas. A sound like a rifle shot, the right front quarter of the car slumped to the pavement and a stream of sparks shot along the right side. In that moment of clarified time that emergency allows, I knew we hadn't blown a tire, as there was no rattling of trashed rubber. I thought we'd lost a wheel and made mental note to raise hell with the shop that had just changed us from winter tires, aligned and balanced the wheels. We are truly showering the road with sparks and, the car being front-wheel drive, there's no power available and precious little steering. Rather than a steered automobile, we have suddenly become a trajectory.

Fortunately, I am an experienced enough driver not to have hit the brakes. I'm rather sure, had that been the case, we'd have flipped. Fortunately as well, we were on one of the infrequent straightaways, rather than an outside curve, which would as surely have put us over the guard rail and in the ditch. The ditch is not a place I favor at 80 MPH. So, it was instead a rather agonized half mile of showered sparks, adjustment to the changed and much lessened degree of control one depends upon in a steering-wheel and eventual stop, well over on the shoulder. A long exhalation of breath, a glance across at Misha, a reach to the button for the emergency flashers. The man who was behind us on this nearly empty highway, pulls in front of us, stops, puts on his flashers and walks back to us, his face perhaps more white with relief than mine. He and Misha converse in Czech, all of us standing in the slight rain. His thought was that we had caught fire. He had no cell-phone, the batteries on Misha's nearly spent, he offered to take us to the nearest all-night service station, but we declined, unwilling to leave the car and our wide-eyed labrador. A lovely man, truly helpful and we waved him on his way, wondering what next, but glad to be unhurt. The right front wheel is wedged sideways in the wheel well. Something truly amazing and very expensive must have happened and very expensive has not been on our menu for years. Back in the car, Misha's hands shake so that she can hardly handle the insurance cards. I walk back fifty yards to set out the reflective emergency triangle.

She calls the number, speaks very rapidly in Czech, finds it is the other number on the card that needs calling, dials again, gives our location and the battery dies. We wait. No one stops and we don't need them to stop, but take offense anyway at the fact that they couldn't know that. We're warm, much worried about what's happened to our old car, wondering how the hell we'll squeeze this into the budget, but warm. An hour later the emergency service arrives, Great guy with the wrong equipment, no way he's going to hand-crank this car onto a trailer. An hour later the right guy gets there, smiling, helpful, absolutely professional in how he power winches the car from the back onto his flat-bed truck, blocking what needs to be blocked, skidding what needs to be skidded, careful and skillful in the extreme. It's 4AM, still raining, a building traffic of trucks whooshing by as we climb into his cab for the ride to our mechanic, our Honda behind us like a backpack. I realize as I write this that I never had my own mechanic before. But then I've never driven a ten year old car with a quarter million miles on it either, both of these the advantage of having taken up a writer's life.

Misha chats this fellow up as I sit slumped against the window for the half hour's drive, lost in a half-world of terror over the expense, dog tiredness and relief that we are all of us, including Barkley (who rides the backpack), safe, undamaged and merely exhausted. The towing bill is fair, extraordinarily fair, considering that this lovely man has been called from bed in the middle of the night. He drops us off at home at 6AM and the odyssey complete, we collapse into bed, sleeping until three. Tomorrow (actually today, I realize---all of this has happened today, which is Saturday), we'll call the mechanic to forewarn him of what awaits his Monday Morning.

Chance, I reflect, before oblivion envelops me. The chance misfortune, the chance avoidance of disaster and perhaps death, the chance meeting of those unknown, kind souls who stop to help, bring experience out of bed with a smile and make life livable.

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