Everything That Went Wrong During My 18-Hour Drive

Error #1 was deciding to do the drive in one go in the first place.

I moved my stuff from California to Colorado last month, after an idyllic summer in Italy.

When I told one of my Italian friends the journey was about 15 hours (not including stops for food, gas, etc.) he asked how long the first and second leg of the journey would be, respectively. I said I was planning to power through in one go.

“That’s so American,” he said.

land of the free and home of the dumb ladies who do 18-hour drives on purpose.

And it was so American! The American roads I know and love tolerate! Which are the desolate and largely unexciting ones through places like Arizona and Utah. And always Las Vegas. Every time I go on a long drive, it somehow always seems to involve Las Vegas.

4:30 a.m.

Zelda (the dog), and I and our piles of snacks loaded into the car. My boyfriend was already in Colorado awaiting our arrival.

7:03 a.m.

I started hearing a terrible banging noise. Great! That’s what you want to hear two hours into a 15-hour drive. I pulled over. Something was probably rattling around in the trunk, considering the trunk contained, among other things: my enormous suitcase, a collapsed dog crate, a pile of books, four random pieces of clothing I’d left behind in my mom’s closet, five candles from my grandmother, two sets of jumper cables, and a granola bar from, like, 2013. This is an accurate representation of how my mind feels most of the time, so if you’re wondering how I’m doing, maybe don’t ask. 

Maybe the candles were rattling around? Hm. I figured, just to be safe, I’d take out the giant suitcase and the crate and switch them around. That could help, possibly.

I got back on the road and the noise resumed within minutes.

Fabulous.

This probably meant that, rather than being something in the trunk, there was something wrong with the car itself. Maybe I could just ignore it until I made it to Colorado. And then, when I got to Colorado, continue ignoring it. 

I was seriously considering this idea, but it was difficult to think over the sound of the THWACK THWACK THWACK BUBUM BUBUM BUBUM of whatever was happening to the car. 

Then it hit me.

Fortunately, it did not hit me literally.

This had happened before on long drives. Twice. It wasn’t anything serious. It was the little rubber strip that runs along the top of the windshield, on the outside of the car. Part of it had come unstuck from the windshield and was flopping around in the wind, banging on the windshield.

The solution was, possibly, even more American than driving for 15 hours straight: duct tape. I had some in the car from the last time this happened. I got out and taped the hell out of it. It looked great!

Can you believe an amateur did this?

8:06 a.m.

Okay, back on the road. Ten minutes later, a warning light on the dashboard turned on. I’ve never seen this particular light go on before, so I didn’t know what it meant.

I pulled off, figuring I could get situated at a gas station and let Zelda out to stretch her legs. After consulting my car’s manual, it turned out the light had something to do with tire pressure. Which seemed dumb, because there is another light related to tire pressure, and what’s the difference? This question is rhetorical, please don’t tell me. Anyway. Zelda did her business, I topped off the gas tank, I did my business, and I looked around for a place to put air in my tires. 

I found myself in the area behind the gas station, where there were only a bunch of semi-trucks. That felt wrong for sure. But there was one of the “air for your tires” thingies.¹ I pulled up next to it, hesitantly. It looked different than the ones I’d used before.

“That’s not going to work,” a man informed me, bluntly but not unkindly. This “air for your tires” thingy was for semi-truck tires only. “You need to go to the tire shop.”

Not at my most comfortable surrounded by enormous trucks, as someone who relates a little too hard to this meme when it comes to car stuff, I thanked him and drove in the direction he had vaguely gestured toward.

I saw a tire shop (also surrounded by semi-trucks).

I saw a sign that said “AIR <<<<----” with some arrows. I followed the arrows, but could not find the air pump anywhere. I circled the tire shop a few times, like some sort of dumb shark. But hey! The light had turned off anyway.  Probably a sign from the universe to get back on the road/in the saddle.

I got back on the road/in the saddle/into the welcoming arms of feigned ignorance.

11:08

Nice while it lasted! The warning light went on again. I got off at a regular gas station with an air pump, where I put air in my tires and listened to a voice note from my friend like it was a podcast. Because, as American as this experience was, we have to remember that I’m European now!!!!

12:55 p.m.

I was enjoying some of my nutritious snacks, like peanut M&Ms and white cheddar popcorn (which I love so much that I only allow myself to consume it on long road trips, because I don’t have enough self control to keep it in the house), when Zelda started getting a little antsy.

I pulled off for her to pee on a little exit. She peed by a bush. I peed behind a bush. The sun was bright, and my eyes started to get a little sensitive.

If you are a longtime fan of my blog, aka my mother or grandmother, then you might know that my eyes sometimes get very photosensitive, to the point where it’s difficult to keep them open. I don’t know what causes this and, yes, I have asked the eye doctor about it, and she said “use eyedrops,” and yes, I am planning to ask another eye doctor about it too now that I have good health insurance again. And yes, I am saying “eye doctor” because I can never remember whether it should be optometrist or ophthalmologist but “eye doctor” seems right enough.

Anyway, it happened in that moment. I sat there on the side of the road, barely able to squint my eyes open, let alone drive. Applying and reapplying eyedrops. This lasted somewhere between 20 minutes and 500 years.

Eventually, I took a deep breath, put on two pairs of sunglasses, and drove slowly along the frontage road. Which turned out to actually be the entrance to the highway. Oh well. I stayed in the slow lane in the most stressy, hunched-over posture you can imagine until my eyes just sort of gradually got better.

I had to stop a few more times to re-tape the windshield. The tire light went back on, then back off. Zelda and I couldn’t get our pee schedules synced up with when I needed to get gas, so they had to all be separate stops. And with all the stopping, the drive stretched out to be 18 hours. I was a little delirious by the end of it.

But driving 18 hours without getting in an accident? Without anyone dying? I say that’s pretty incredible.

So now, I start something new. I’m not wandering around Rome drinking spritzes and meeting people from far-flung places, no. But I have a great job, a great guy, a great dog. All in a great place. And I’m making new friends and exploring the city and doing a lot of baking.

The thing is, sometimes it feels like there are so many different ways for life to go wrong. But sometimes, when the light hits just right, it feels like there are so many different ways for it to go right. And I’m grateful for the days with that sort of light.

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Question of the Week: What’s the most American? An 18-hour drive, apple pie, or a two-car garage? What are some other very-American things, in your opinion?

Recommendation of the Week: Almost cried laughing while reading this piece about why meal prepping is a scam by

Kate Nissen

over at

The Stump

. “Meal prepping,” she writes so, so eloquently AND bravely, “is a lie sold to you by Big Tupperware.”

Thank you so much for reading!

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1. The technical term for the machine used to put air in one’s tires.