BRING BACK THE HORSE AND CARRAIGE

BRING BACK THE HORSE AND CARRIAGE

Being on the road again, (what else is new in our lives?), we encounter so many things, the good, the bad, and the ugly.

The good things we see are the trees, flowers, new buildings, and all the wonders the earth can throw at us.

The bad will always include traffic that never seems to fail to bring vehicles to a screeching halt. The traffic will slow or stop at any given time due to foul weather, a minor accident (fender bender), a vehicle that has broken down, or perhaps just a policeman who pulled over a speeder to hand him that dreaded ticket.

The ugly happens when there is a serious accident on the road. Perhaps someone died in that horrific crash.

Then, there are things that happen that you just can see until you arrive at your destination.

We were traveling to an appointment with our doctor who happens to be a few towns away. Okay, so the doctor in question is three hours away from our home. Why in heaven’s name would we travel so far? Because he’s the only doctor who specializes in a certain treatment my husband needs.

Halfway to the appointment, a small, open, flatbed truck went barreling down the road. Clearly, the driver was in a hurry to go somewhere. His driving skills were fine. He drove accurately according to the curves and bends in the road. The problem we encountered with his truck was that, while his driving skills were fine, his trying down his equipment left a lot to be desired.

On his flatbed, he’d loaded several plastic 5-gallon gas jugs along with his other lawn service equipment. I guess he was under the misguided impression that as long as he pushed all his equipment close to the cab of his truck, all would be fine.

It wasn’t.

One of his gas jugs wriggled its way towards the end of the truck and then – bounced off!

It bounced off and hit our passenger tire with force.

Before you ask, no, we didn’t and couldn’t stop. There was too much traffic and the truck just kept on trucking to wherever it was he was going.

The speed limit on that road is 70-miles-per-hour, which means that ninety percent of the traffic was doing around 75.

Once off the highway, we noticed a noise under our car. We didn’t see anything odd. The gas jug hit us, bounced off, and away. So, what was the noise?

We didn’t know.

NEVER ASSUME ANYTHING!

We thought since the heavy jug hit the tire; it began to wobble. Nope! It did not. We drove home after the appointment and kept using the car thinking that whatever happened would correct itself.

It didn’t.

A week later, we took the car to the service station.

The diagnosis?

The rack-and-pinion system was damaged.

Thank God for insurance.

Two weeks later, the mechanic called saying the car was ready. We picked it up, thankfully we now had our vehicle back. Only . . . .

We noticed that while the steering was tighter (as it should have been), that horrible, loud clunking noise was still present.

Next step? The car was, once again, back with the mechanic.

New diagnosis? The rack-and-pinion system, the NEW system was defective. It had to be replaced! Here we go again.

Two weeks later, the call came in. The car was ready. Or so we were told.

Now, here we are one week after that and back with the mechanic.

New diagnosis: the struts were damaged. Oh Hell! I could have told him that and I’m NOT a mechanic. You could actually FEEL the wheel bouncing.

We’d been in touch with the insurance company all this time and they agreed with us that no matter how many times we had to take the car back to the mechanic, they’d keep paying until he got it right.

Right now, we’re hoping the third time is the charm and he’ll actually fix it this time with NO MORE surprises. (I hate surprises!)

I began thinking that maybe the so-called modern marvels of automobiles weren’t the great invention we all thought it was. It’s like a domino effect. Gas prices keep increasing which means that oil refineries must keep their employees happy by raising their salaries. Mechanics need to get to work so they need to buy gas, so now their salaries need to be increased. Each thing affects the next until the little guy ends up being pushed under.

We’d just gotten the call telling us what it will now cost the insurance company to fix this latest problem. Yes, they’ll pay but part of the problem is that they can be tardy in mailing out the check. If the car is ready before we get that check, in order to have our “fixed” car, we’d need to hand over their mechanic’s fee and then wait for the insurance company to reimburse us. Who the heck has this kind of money to keep one stupid car on the road?

Maybe we should really think about bringing back the horse and carriage. But then, we’d have to buy hay and oats for the horse, liniment for its sore muscles, build a trough for its water, hire a veterinarian to keep it healthy, and find a place to house the animal since we can’t do that here in the city where we live.

THEN, we’d need to put the carriage in a storage facility, maintain every aspect of it, make sure the axels are strong, create a canopy with retractable sides for foul weather, and make sure the wheels are kept in pristine condition.

No matter how you try to get around it, getting around anything is expensive.

My only alternative is to win the damn lottery!

Oh wait, I didn’t buy a ticket. I see another quick road trip coming up!