One early and dark spring morning, I was heading down the highway on my way to work, when all of a sudden, something appeared in my headlights. Before I could react, I crashed into this “something” - which went into, under, and over my car. When I managed to pull over on the side of the highway and not have a heart attack, I looked around to see what I just hit. There, over in the median, were some partial coils of thick metal construction mesh - the kind that's used when pouring concrete sidewalks. The partial coils must have fallen off of some construction vehicle and were now knocked safely out of the way by my car, but they were still vibrating from our collision - almost as much as I was.
After regaining my composure and my breath, I got back in my car and drove the rest of the way to work. As I drove along, I noticed that my car was making a strange clicking sound, and as I went further, there was the beginnings of a low rumbling noise coming from somewhere underneath.
The sun was coming up when I got to work. Getting out of my car, I could see not only a chip in my windshield, but also an abundance of scratches covering the front end of my car - including my dented-in hood.
Over the coming weeks, the noises increased in both volume and frequency. Getting rid of them seemed to elude even the best mechanics - well, mine anyway. No sooner would I get one of the noises fixed, then another noise would crop up - and before long, the previous noise would return - only worse. My car was sounding like, and smelling like, a loud, poorly maintained motor boat.
Before too long, my car not only sounded and smelled like a motorboat, it began handling like one, as well. Rather than feel like it was gripping the road, it began to feel as if it was floating over the pavement - and not in a good way. Even a straight drive required constant steering as the car tended to float from one side of the lane to the other.
As the months passed, the car got louder and louder. It finally approached the time where I had to bring it in for the annual inspection. Under normal conditions, there was no way the car was going to pass inspection - just by looks alone. But to make it even worse, after the end of the month, the state was changing the inspection process, making it even more difficult. This meant that if I waited until my current sticker expired, the likelihood that my car would pass became even more of a fantasy.
So, I developed a Master Plan. Step One of my Master Plan was that I was going to wait until the very last day of the month - and then get the car inspected. I figured if (and by “if”, I mean “when”) they gave me a rejection sticker, it would give me another 30 days to drive the car. That was Step One. There was no Step Two.
So, the last day of the month arrived and it was time to get it done. Before heading out, I told my co-worker that I was leaving to get my car inspected. He made a few sarcastic remarks, clearly relishing the idea of the inevitable failure which lay ahead.
I drove a few miles over to a neighboring town, to an out of the way inspection station. I had never been to this particular station before but I had been told that “those guys will pass anything.” I figured I would put this to the test.
By the time I got to the station, it was raining pretty heavily. I took my place at the end of a line of about twenty other cars. Each car was of similar quality to my own. Each owner apparently had the same Master Plan. After a moment or two, a woman pulled behind me, her car sounding no better than mine. I glanced over at her and she gave me a brief, embarrassed smile, as if to say, "Yeah, me too. Please don't tell anyone I was here."
It felt like we were all waiting outside of the principal's office, or waiting for our homework to be returned with the inevitable bad grade. I sat in line in this exclusive club and watched as the dark clouds rolled above and listened as the rain beat down on the roof of my car- and I waited for the inevitable death sentence.
As the rain poured down, I glanced in the side view mirror and I noticed that the gasket of the door behind me was coming off. It was now sticking out the side of the car. Just what I needed - one more thing to draw attention to my sub-par car - as if the dented-in hood, plethora of scratches, smell of exhaust and the rumbling and ticking noises weren't enough. I figured I better deal with the protruding door gasket, so I got out of my car, into the driving rain, and I started to yank on it, attempting to rip it off the car. As the rain poured over me, I saw that same woman watching from the car behind me. She had that same sad, embarrassed smile - but this time, it was for my benefit.
After several minutes in the pouring rain, I managed to rip off a portion of the offending gasket and I threw it on the floor of my back seat. I got back in my car, dripping wet, but satisfied that I had just increased the possibility of my passing the inspection.
One by one the cars slowly advanced until finally, it was my turn to drive into the inspection station.
This particular inspection station was set up in what looked like an old, open ended barn. You would drive your car in one end, park the car (leaving the engine running,) the inspector would scrape off your old sticker and then proceed with the inspection. Part, if not all of the inspection was about checking the emissions. This was done by taking a long probe which was hooked up to some kind of a computer monitor, and shoving the probe into the tailpipe of the car for a period of time - basically the automotive equivalent of a colonoscopy. After as couple of minutes, they would remove the probe, put a new sticker on your windshield and you would drive out the other end of the barn.
I pulled in and the inspector came over, took my money, and he scraped off my old sticker.
So, I'm sitting in my now sticker-less car with the engine rumbling away, trying to act cool - and trying not to inhale my diesel-like exhaust. And I'm watching in my rear view mirror as the guy sticks the probe into the tailpipe of my car. He’s standing there, staring at the computer monitor... and waiting. After maybe a minute or so, I see him scowl at the monitor and he turns and scowls down at the probe, and then I see him lean over and look at the back of my head through my rear window. Then I see him turn back to the monitor and tap it a couple of times - then he repeats this pattern for a couple of more times.
Finally, I see him take the probe out of the tailpipe, and he takes it over by the computer monitor. While staring at the monitor, he proceeds to start swinging the sensor around in the air. After several minutes of swinging this thing, he finally stops, presses a couple of buttons, then puts the probe back in it's holster. He comes over and opens my passenger door - and then he slaps a new sticker on my windshield and tells me that I'm all set. My car had passed. I was good for one more year.
My Master Plan had worked better than I expected. Rather than get a mere another thirty days of use out of my motorboat-like car, I was now good for another full year. As if that wasn't enough good news, when I got back to work, my co-worker was waiting for me. He could barely contain himself. He asked me how I made out with the inspection and when I told him that it had passed, his smiling face immediately melted into anger. To this day, I can still hear him as he slapped his desk and yelled, "There's no justice in this world!" Apparently, he had just had his car inspected the week before, and it had been rejected - due to a burned out license plate bulb.
Thankfully, there were no more incidents the following year - not with my car, anyway. But it was obvious that getting through any more inspections was completely out of the question - assuming my car would even make it another year.
Well, it did make it another year, but just barely.
Almost exactly a year after that inspection, it was time to send the car off to the junkyard. I had made arrangements with a towing company to bring it to a mechanic who, for some unknown reason, was willing to take this poor car off my hands. No more dealing with futile repairs. No more feeling the rumblings below my feet as I drove down smooth roadways. But no more running errands together or picking up and dropping the kids off at school. Not in this car, anyway.
It had been raining the day before the tow truck came and the rain continued into the night. Jake was almost ready to hop into bed when he suddenly realized that the car would be gone the next day. Since he, like other people I know, gets attached to these kinds of things, I told him that we could go outside and take a picture of him with the car. That way, he would have something to remember it by.
So, just before I put him to bed, Jake and I went outside. And in the rain and the darkness, he stood by the car while I took a picture.
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