Therefore, I wasn't even a LITTLE bit surprised to walk out after work and find that, lo and behold, the battery in my car had died. Why? Who knows. Even the repairman who came out to give me a jump seemed perplexed, and that's never a good sign. But hey, it's a 12 year old car. It's seen a lot. I call him Clint for a reason. He's doing his best.
Now, more than anything I'd been looking forward to getting home, taking a nap, and having a nice relaxing evening. No worries, I thought, I'll just take a nice little drive out to the countryside and back in order to charge my battery. Got a nice book on tape and a granola bar, life is good.
I should have known. I should have effing known that my bad luck couldn't end there. About 20 minutes out of town, my right front tire blew up.
 |
| F**k this shit I'm out! |
See that tiny tire waaay in the background? Yeah. That used to be on my car. Pretty cool, right? This is how it happened: I was driving along, happy as you please, when suddenly my car jerked like a Great Dane that's just seen her best friend on the other side of the street and has conveniently forgotten that her owner is on the other end of the leash. I slowed from about 50 km/hr in a matter of seconds and tried to keep my car from shuddering off the road.
As I told a friend soon after the incident, at first I thought the road was messed up, then quickly realized that it was my own car that was messed up. Luckily there was space to pull over soon, and the second I stopped moving and the reek of burnt rubber wafted in through my windows, I could guess what had happened.
 |
| fuck |
It was worse than I'd even expected. The best part was, the car hadn't been running long enough to charge the battery, so as I climbed out of my car to survey the damage, I had to leave the engine on as a bonus backdrop to my onrushing panic attack. Each frantic breath just brought in more of the acrid reek of rubber. I wasn't entirely sure where I was. I was hungry and cold, not entirely dressed for the weather.
I breathed.
Luckily, my insurance comes with an app that will contact local repair shops and send people out to fix you up. So I punch in my info and wait for the call, only to realize that once they called, I would have to know where the hell I was. I knew the name of the small town that was nearby, but I was pretty sure that and my rudimentary Korean skill was not going to be enough.
Luck! Across the road, an older lady was waiting at the bus stop. As the mechanic spoke to me like a child after I asked him to slow down, I sprinted across the 2 lane highway and desperately pushed my phone into her hands with a plea to "explain this location." All was well. The mechanic was on his way. She gave me her phone number and told me to text her when I made it back into town.
Eventually, the mechanic showed up, and to my embarrassment, it was the same man who had fixed my battery not one hour before. He asked a few questions and I fumbled my way through answers, and in the end it was decided that we'd have to call a tow truck, and I'd need to buy two new tires. Apparently they come in packs of two. Learning!
Instead of waiting on the side of the road, we left my keys hidden on the ruined rim of what used to be a tire and drove back to the repair shop together. We sat in silence for a while, each of my muscles tensed from anxiety barely held in check.
"How many times have we met?"
It took me a second to realize what he asked and understand the question, but finally I hazarded "Twice?"
Turns out it was actually our third time meeting; he'd replaced my battery a few months ago, and he assured me that my car wasn't garbage, it was just old. These things are natural.
"This is a great day. Do you know why?"
I hesitated to answer, worrying that I was now stuck in a car with a mechanic trying to hit on me.
"No one was hurt! Your car could have flipped over! It could have been serious. But it wasn't. So, today is an amazing day. Right?"
I supposed it was. As I sat in the office waiting for my new tires, watching the pet channel and sipping bad instant coffee, waiting for my muscles to unknot themselves, I couldn't stop thinking about that. Today is a great day because all the things that could have happened didn't happen, which was pretty much in perfect opposition to what I'd been thinking all day.
All this to say I made it home safe and my little trashwagon is puttering along smoothly once again. I'm grateful that there are kind mechanics and women at bus stops to help me when I feel like the world is giving me a tough break.
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