The
Catchy Title
telling rambling stories since friday
night
The first rule of going off-roading is: Never Go Off-Roading. I learned this the hard way. As the name implies, off-roading does not happen on a road. Often, off-roading happens off of the road. In possession, as I am, of an SUV, I thought it would be an excellent idea to drive it through mud. Further, seeing as it had rained for two or more days, mud was in no short supply. I was talking to my buddy Mike.
"Mike," I said, "you want to go
off-roading today?"
"Yeah!" he said, his eyes lighting up
like a kid on Christmas morning. "I know this spot at the end of this dirt
road!"
It sounded like a little too much for me to handle. I had just wanted to get my car muddy. I declined his invitation, even though it was me who had brought it up. I hopped in my car and went off to the dirt road in question. I’ve made it a habit to take this road home because its made of dirt, and has a lot of puddles. My co-pilot Adam as riding in the backseat, silently miffed about being displaced by Kathryn, who was riding shotgun. I told him of the declined offer to go off-roading. His eyes lit up like a kid on Christmas morning.
"Really?!" he said excitedly. "Why
don’t we go, jung?!"
It’s always been his practice to call
me "jung" in order to bring us closer so he can ask me to do something crazy.
"Why don’t we just check it out a little bit, jung." He said, in a slyly
persuasive manner. I obliged. "It’ll only be a few minutes." I thought to
myself. It’s ironic looking back on your own last words.
We had gotten to the end of the road. We now were sliding in the mud on the edge of nowhere, having past the middle somewhere down the road. I saw a large puddle and, seeing as I may be addicted to driving through puddles, I was in no shape to refuse the temptation. Adam chirped in behind me with a warning. This puddle was too big. Why don’t we just go home? Naturally, I went down the dark, muddy path. It was exhilarating. The car was sliding through the deep, blackish mud like a skier going down a hill. Turning the wheel a whole 360 degree turn barely made any impact in the actual direction of the car. Ironically, I found and talked to my buddy Sean, who had also found it a good day to go off-roading. I continued on my way. Headlights were coming. It was Mike. I stopped and we talked. There was a field to the left, full of tall grass and trees the height of a tall man. I struggled and slipped the car into the field. In hindsight, if it was that hard to get into the field, why did I think it would be any better trying to get out? Oh well.
Mike and I, passengers in tow, decided to go to the end of the field. There was a hunting stand in a tree imposing with its discontent. We decided to turn back. I was on my way out when my car dipped down. Being accustomed to driving on a flat, level surface, being below the surface of the ground really made an impact on me. It impacted me in a way that said, "Holy crap. The car is stuck!" And it was. Though those aren’t the exact words I used. Luckily, Mike was there to help. He got his tow straps (which looked more suited to tow luggage than trucks) and hooked us together.
"OKAY!" he yelled from the drivers’ seat. I was instructed to "punch it" when he powered backwards. It worked! I was out of the mud! What a harrowing adventure it had been, and what a great story I could tell! It was then that Mike’s car died. His battery must have run out of power pulling me out, and his hood sat directly in front of my own. I wasn’t going anywhere. Adam and Kathryn stood on the periphery. They were noticeably worried. It was getting late, and the light gray of the stormy sky was turning darker and darker shades of a navy-blue-shaded-grey. Kathryn’s parents were under the impression that she was "eating". Panic soon overcame us, and we had to eat Adam. No, we didn’t, but the panic had led me to call my friend and perennial "Oh-my-god-you-have-to-help-me" buddy, Arman.
"Do you have jumper cables?" I
said in a mild panic over the phone.
"Yeah." He said in a voice tinged
with confusion.
"You know how to use them?" I asked.
The lights came on in his head.
"Where are you?"
I told him the story and he sniggered
in a way a mother does when her son’s hand is stuck in a cookie jar. He said he
was on his way. In the meantime, we waded in the mud. I had an excellent idea. I
decided that I could veer to the left, through the under-hanging branches of a
nearby tree and land finally on terra firma. And so I did. My car met the
branches and was stuck in them. Yes, it is safe to say that my car was stuck in
a tree. This only made everyone more nervous. Kathryn, visibly shaken now, put
her face in her hands. When she pulled away her hands, I found she was laughing.
The events are too diverse to adequately describe. Each person has their own version, and always adds details to the version I experienced. Chronologically, I’m not sure how it went, but it went something like this.
Kathryn had called her friend, Cameron, to come and pick her up. Being, as we were, in the middle of nowhere, she had no idea how to get there. I gave her directions to go to a stop sign, the corner of the dirt road we were on and the larger dirt road that led to civilization. She understood, to a degree, and I now turned to Kathryn. Alan, the passenger of Mike’s car, wanted to go back home, too. However, it was Adam who know how to get there. Therefore, we effectively had a whole party to go to the road. I gave Kathryn a bright orange hat I had used in history class, and sent the whole of them on their way. Only later did I find out what happened. Adam had been running along with Kathryn and Alan. Seeing as how Adam is in a leg cast, Kathryn turned him back. It was then Kathryn and Alan ran to the corner. However, they did not run to the corner that was dictated to the driver who was picking them up. They ran to a corner almost two miles away. On one side of the V-shaped road, lay Cameron, clueless and lost in the middle of nowhere; exactly in the spot I directed her. On the other side of the V, the passengers she was supposed to pick up. Luckily, Sean had come to the rescue and picked up Kathryn and Alan. He drove them to Cameron, and Kathryn left. To be honest, I don’t know what happens next. Everyone was going every which way, and I’m not sure what happened when.
I do know that my friend and perennial jumper-cables-buddy Arman had showed up and given Mike a jump. His car worked! He pulled me out of the tree, where he immediately got stuck. I waited with him for Sean to come. Mike made one more dire effort to get unstuck. The tow straps got stuck around his axle, and spun around it like a yo-yo string. There was nothing left to do, so we drove my car out to the road to meet Sean. When Sean arrived, I gave him my flashlight and my pocketknife and I went home with Adam, who Sean had found on the side of the road. The details of the rest are dodgy at best, but everyone made it out and home safely.
I was covered, head to toe, in a cold, wet, mud. As I eyed the clean socks and jeans of my warm home, my eyes lit up like a kid on Christmas morning. It was the only time I’ve been happy getting socks for Christmas.