TheBanyanTree: tow truck

[Tobie Shapiro]

October 30, 200000000000000000000000005



Dear fellow travellers,

	Friday was a day with crowded black ink in my calendar.  Back 
to back appointments, here, there, back and forth, all the way 
through the late afternoon.  So I declared that we'd be going out to 
dinner.  Someplace cheap.

	We parked in the Savings and Loan lot which is unused at 
night and unpoliced.  We went in, ordered a hell of a lot of onion 
rings (this is not healthy.  do not try this at home.), ate our 
dinner of burgers and steaks, soup and salad, lingered a little bit. 
Both Meyshe and Feyna had their noses in books at the table, and I 
just smiled.  I suppose I could bring my own book, but who would pass 
the salt?  And wouldn't we look like a new age family, all three 
people off in a world invented by three different authors.  Feyna is 
devouring Harry Potter's 6th, Meyshe had Anne Frank's diary, the dog 
eared, memorized version, and I would be reading something by S.Y. 
Agnon, oh dear, winner of the Nobel Prize in literature some time 
earlier in the 20th century.  I don't mind them reading at the table. 
It's cozy and intelligent and cultured (depending upon the reading 
matter, of course), and even friendly that we allow each other our 
indulgences in our private inner lives.  I think of Amy Carter who 
scandalized Washington when President Jiminy used to let her read at 
the table.  It endeared her to me.

	After dinner, we walked back to the car, got in and buckled 
up.  I turned the trusty key, and the van wouldn't start.  I mean 
nothing happened.  It was completely kaput.  The lights wouldn't even 
come on.  This was a very dead deceased battery.  And it had been 
just fine on the way down there.  This is just the sort of surprise 
that my life has knocked in my way lately.  Always at the edge of my 
seat for what will happen next.  I'm the one in charge.  I take care 
of everyone.  No one else to consult about what to do to rescue our 
small party from the way things are.  The way they have become. 
After a little thinking, and a 20 second allowance for regret and 
goddamnit, I walked us to the nearest gas station to see if we could 
get a jump start.  Only the lone attendant for the gas pumps and 
snack purchases was there.  He couldn't help, and it seemed he also 
couldn't be bothered.  He was wrapped in his anonymous bubble, but he 
wasn't reading any book, so it distressed me.  We should show at 
least a slight interest in the travail of others, maybe even just for 
show.  But no.

	So I pulled out my insurance card, and called the emergency 
road service number.  The nice woman way off in Rhode Island 
connected to a local towing company and contracted them to circle 
round to our stuck car on the other side of the country and do what 
needed to be done.   "He'll be there in half an hour."

	Feyna suggested we use the time to take an evening stroll, 
and we headed up College Avenue where we found an ice cream parlor, 
hopping with life.  We stuffed both kids with ice cream (they had 
pumpkin, so Feyna's evening was a success no matter what was going to 
happen with the van), and then the cell phone rang.  It was the 
driver of the tow truck, asking for specific directions.  We walked 
back to meet him on the corner, and he appeared with an enormous flat 
bed tow truck, the kind that has an entire floor that will slide out 
and meet the gravel, then lift the towed vehicle into the air and 
onto the back of the flat. The lights on the roof of his cab rotated 
and flashed and danced in the dark night.  He was the mother ship, 
and we greeted him as such, with our arms waving wildly, pointing in 
the direction of our wrecked ship.

	It is not easy to get a triple limousine length flatbed into 
a small parking lot to issue a jump start.  But he was a seasoned 
veteran, he was.  And his jumper cables were as long as my life.  The 
van started right up.  But as he removed the cables, it expired 
again.  My car was in a coma, and there was nothing I could do about 
it.  It was time to tow the inert large lump to my favourite service 
station up the road a piece.  Our hero towman alternated between 
positioning his tow truck and pushing the van into the street, with 
the driver's side door open and his hand on the steering wheel.  He 
was a little man, but powerful, and we nearly applauded.  Then we all 
piled into the cab and he drove to the station where we unloaded our 
dumb cargo, I left the key on the floor of the car, we piled back 
into the cab and he drove us home.

	Our house is on a vermicular narrow street, where you have to 
pull over when a car approaches from the other direction.  We warned 
him about it, but he looked down the dark street and harrumphed. 
This would be no trouble for him.  I thought I should tell him about 
the hairpin curve down the street.  How was he going to manage that? 
But he insisted and had already turned the corner.  We three fell out 
of the cab, and returned to our shelter.  Food, clothing and shelter 
is the message for the day.  Survival is good.

	In the morning, there was no sign of the tow truck.  It had 
not been beached on the strip of land and trees around the hairpin 
curve.  It had not dropped a shattered tail light.  It had also not 
lifted up into the air, straight, and flown away where heros fly.  He 
must have made it.

	All the dreams I have of being in the driver's seat with my 
van hurtling out of control on a freeway, the car delaying its 
response to my frantic turning of the wheel.  I crash into dividers, 
run over traffic cones,  careen into lanes I don't want to be in, 
cringe from oncoming traffic and just barely avoid head on 
collisions.  The sun gets in my eyes; the obstacles come towards me 
so fast I can barely see them.  Like tumbling down stairs, out of 
control, I hit the railings on overpasses and crash through them, 
soaring above the world, airborne, knowing that, though I am soaring, 
I am earthbound soon, and I hope to God I can just wake up in time. 
If not, what will become of me and this symphony I am playing here on 
earth?  Who will take care of my children if my ship smashes headlong 
onto the rocks and tears asunder?  I should write a will.  I should 
write a will quickly, before any bad dreams can come true;  leave 
everything to my children, and direct the world to be kind to them, 
kinder than it is used to being.

	Love,

	Tobie
-- 




Tobie Helene Shapiro
Berkeley, California   USA

tobie at shpilchas.net