Remember the Alamo

Texas. Or at least, that's where my phone thought I was before it coughed its last and gave up in the dry heat of the afternoon. I believed it; there was nothing in sight but miles and miles of scattered shrubs and the occasional eighteen-wheeler that hurtled past me without slowing down.

Though momentarily caught up in the vastness of the world, I still had to get the Buick out from the ditch. The front wheels spun fruitlessly in the dirt; I stamped on the gas again. A great big cloud of dust went up while the car stolidly refused to budge. No matter how the engine growled and sputtered, the chassis remained indifferent, as if it were a preoccupied mother and the 3.8L V6 no more than an unruly stepchild. An old man in a pickup truck drove past, but rather than stopping to help he just slowed, flipped me off, and yelled "fag" before driving off again. All I really got out of my efforts was dehydration and a cloud of dust half the size of Texas.

The sun painted great red arcs along the horizon as it fell. A cool breeze drifted from bush to bush. All in all, I couldn't have chosen a better spot to be stranded, between the sunset and the -- wait, that's actually a complete lie. I could have picked a way better place to get stranded: next to a tow truck, near a bar, inside of a bar -- anywhere where I wouldn't have to spend another night cramped inside the car as I slowly died of thirst. A headache started to set in as I contemplated the situation. I had eaten a bag of stale pretzels and finished the last of my water a few hours ago. The car still refused to budge, the tires simply not getting enough traction to lever the car out of the hole Dean had put it in. Even if I had a rope and some kind of a winch (news flash: I didn't) there would have been nothing to tie it to other than some shrubs that looked like they'd tip over if you sneezed at them funny. No, I had to get the car out under its own power, and to do that I'd have to get the tires to actually dig into the ground. I took the floor mats out of the backseat and wedged them underneath the wheels, and with them in between the tires and the dirt, the car finally had enough traction to lever itself, achingly slowly, out of the ditch and back onto the road. I tossed the mats back inside the car and stopped at the first place I found, a little spot called "The Hole: Food and Booze". Sinking down into a booth, I asked for some water. "This is Texas", the waitress replied, and brought me a beer.