He held my stripped nuts in his hand…

Today really didn't end up exactly as planned. I got up this morning and on a whim took a quick shower in order to skeedaddle over to the movies to catch up on my must-see summer movie list which I had been a little slacking on. Caught up with "The Incredible Hulk." After that I picked up a sandwich and headed over to a different park than yesterdays outing, a better park with better grass and a better water feature, for an impromptu picnic and to continue reading When You Are Engulfed in Flames. The gentle breeze and steady white noise of the fountain in front of me made it easy to get totally lost in the pages or wonderful stories. The comfortable folding canvas chair I picked up at a drug store helped my body relax as well. Before I knew it, more than 3 hours had zoomed by and it was time to start my Sunday routine of Target and Trader Joes. Blissfully relaxed I merged into freeway traffic. Barely minutes later, BANG! Whap! Whap! Whap! Whap! "Oh shit!" was the only thing that I could exclaim as I frantically tried to get my car over to the shoulder amidst the Sunday drivers who had apparently never heard the term before and rather than drive a sane speed instead chose to believe they were on the Autobahn. There goes anything even remotely resembling "blissful" and/or "relaxed."

I'm not the complete nancy boy others might mistake me for, I'm not afraid to get my hands dirty under the hood with simple routine maintenance or changing a flat — I've even changed a tire on the 101 by SFO on the median shoulder (it's really more of a suggestion of a shoulder than a real shoulder) with cars whipping by at breakneck speeds (not unlike today) — but so help me, I couldn't get the bolts loose to get the bad tire off. Seriously! They were on way too tight and even putting my full weight into it had wouldn't get them to budge. Worried that I might cause the car to fall off the child's toy they call a jack and crush my foot trying to get the bolts loose, I had no other option but to call for roadside assistance. To his credit he showed up sooner than originally estimated and while I filled out paperwork, he took his chances with the tire swap. While he worked his mechanical magic (with the aid of some real tools), I stood out of the way and out of the hot afternoon sun wondering why the universe feels compelled to balance things out like that.

Couldn't I just have a nice relaxing day or weekend? Must it be cut short with a potentially life threatening predicament? Yes, I realize that I'm being a bit melodramatic, and yes, it's really more a coincidence than part of the universe's doing, but it feels good to be able to put the blame on something outside my control. I didn't notice that my roadside guardian angel (whose name was actually Angel, go figure) had come up to me while I was lost in thought. When I finally became aware of his presence I realized that he was apologizing for stripping my nuts. That's funny, I didn't know I had gotten lucky. Then I looked down to see a pair of horribly mangled orbs of metal. My lug nuts! And they were practically unrecognizable. I was a little surprised when he asked me if I wanted him to put them back on and let the next mechanic battle with removing them or simply leave them off. "Um, you're probably more an expert on these things than I am, but wouldn't it be unsafe to drive with only half of the lug nuts holding the wheel on?" I quizzed? He sheepishly agreed and turned to put them back on the car. When he was done he reminded me not to exceed 40 miles per hour and not to drive further than 50 miles on the Radio Flyer wagon wheel of a spare. Thank goodness it's Sunday and absolutely no tire shops or auto repair places are open because heaven forbid people who work 10 hour days Monday through Friday ever want to get some work done on a freaking weekend. Now I can go straight home without the distraction of buying new tires, or picking up the week's worth of groceries that are part of my Sunday ritual.

I have a habit of dwelling on the negative rather than the positive and so it was no surprise that I began to get down about having to take surface streets to and from work, which more than doubles my commute time. Plus with issues at work the next couple of days, I wasn't sure I'd be able to get my tire replaced within 50 miles because I live just far enough from work that one full commute would meet or surpass the quota and I'm not sure I can take any time away from work to get this fixed. While I'm sure things will work out, right now it doesn't seem possible. But, then again, at least I'm not dead. I should be happy to be alive and a stranger's help in getting my nuts off, even if they were a bit too manhandled in the process. Better manhandled than not handled at all, or say the saying goes, right?