Subaru Boo-Boo

D had an eventful day yesterday.

It all started last week, when his truck exploded and was thus rendered undriveable. His potential dance partner resides in a town about 1.5 hours from here, so he had planned to drive up yesterday afternoon after teaching to practice with her. But, sans truck, how would he get there? ANSWER: Crash course (no pun intended, yet...) in 5-speed driving and borrow your older brother's Subaru!

We spent Tuesday evening traipsing (fantastic word, I know) about in the 5-Points area, me buckled firmly into the backseat like an unruly 5-year old with all of my claws (all 5-year olds have claws) impaling the upholstery in dread - but my dread proved unfounded when D, ever the performer, came through with flying colors.

I had quite a slow, relaxing day at work yesterday and spent lunch sitting in front of the capitol in the sunshine under the statue of a guy on a horse, watching the weirdos walk by and wondering idly about which unlikely events in their life stories culminated in them strolling past as I reclined on the green grass in the breeze. Sigh. I walked home in my natural state of contented joy with Jack Johnson in my playlist, chased Jesper around to tucker him out, had some coffee, and then met my parents at one of our favorite haunts to chat and relax before dance. We were just finishing up when I got a call. It was D, and I hadn't expected to hear from him until at least 10 or 11 PM.

This is how It All went down.

He was on a 5-lane (each way) highway near a junction with another main highway, when traffic caused him to slow down. He continued to downshift as things slowed down even further, until he was going about 20 mph. He tried to put the Subaru in 2nd at this point to speed up when he felt a pop! in the clutch (probably the clutch cable snapping), and couldn't get it into any gear after that. I can't imagine how hellish this would be for a rookie manual driver - it's about as bad as it could possibly get, previously beyond the boundaries of my imaginings of horrible 5-speed situations. I thought I'd been in them all until I heard this story.

Anyways. So there he is, rolling to a stop in the center lane of a busy highway on the cusp of rush hour. He spots a gap in traffic, so he puts the car in neutral, jumps out, starts pushing, and prays for a miracle. Instead, he hears a horrible screech and looks up to see the open-mouthed, terrified visage of the driver of a yellow Mercedes with locked brakes, and realizes that they are doomed to crash. He sprints to the "lee" of the Subaru, guesses which direction momentum will take the two cars once they've collided, and runs for his life across the freeway while being chased by two careening masses of metal, plastic, and combustible liquids.

At this point, I'm slumped disbelievingly in the booth at the restaurant as he calmly relays these events, while my parents watch the expressions march across my face. The cars roll to a halt in an embankment, driver and runner both unhurt. So many cops stopped to see what was going on that I'm sure several people must have called 911. They exchanged information, got everything in order, and then D had the Subaru towed to his favorite mechanic where, quite conveniently, the truck was ready for pickup. He took the truck home, filed an insurance claim, and collapsed on the couch.

Dance practice last night did a lot for his frazzled nerves, and I waltzed around happily and met another person with my last name, of my ancestry, and from my the same state as my dad's side of the family, which is pretty much not normal. Afterwards, we went to D's house, watched the lunar eclipse for a bit, met up with friends, and watched the Int'l Latin finals of the Ohio Star Ball. I know I'm ending up rather factually, but you can't blame me after reliving all of that (and I didn't even live it in the first place!).

DAMMIT! I didn't write my dream!