Dispatch 21
I’m going to preface this dispatch by saying that taking navigational advice from a four-year-old may not be the best course of action.
It is a gorgeous summer day. The sun is shining and there are puffy clouds in the bright blue sky. It’s hot enough. There is a little bit of a breeze. And I am driving in the truck with the windows down, heading back from some errands a couple hours away from home with my co-pilot in the passenger seat.
My co-pilot is four years old. He is big for his age, eighty pounds and nearly five feet tall. I can tell he is feeling the day. He’s all smiles and laughter despite the long ride.
We will be passing a waterfall on the way back home. I went there once when I was in high school. It’s not very big compared to others in the area but it’s big enough and there’s a little pool underneath it that just begs to be splashed around in. It seems like a stop that will make a perfect end to a perfect day.
I pull into town and take a left at the main road. It’s been a couple years since I was at this waterfall and my memory is a little foggy. I’m pretty sure we took a right not far out of town, then followed that road a bit until we came to the falls on the left.
I take the first right out of town onto a small paved road. There’s a good traveling song on the radio and I tell my co-pilot what I’m up to then sing along with the chorus. He smiles and laughs and sings along too.
A couple miles later the road turns to dirt. I don’t remember this part but I was in the bed of a pickup truck when I went so I probably just didn’t notice. I keep driving and singing.
A few miles later the road narrows noticeably. I look at my co-pilot and tell him I think I’ve made a mistake. Then I ask if he wants to turn around or keep going. He wants to keep going. He says he’s enjoying the scenery.
I’m so impressed he’s enjoying the scenery that I do keep going. We talk about the trees we are passing, how the sun is shining through the leaves and what a great day it is.
We pass through a break in a stone wall and the road narrows further. Now it is two tracks through the woods, more like a logging road. My co-pilot wants to keep going. I ignore a feeling of misgiving – surely this road will come out on the other side of the hill – and continue on.
We haven’t gone much further when the road disappears altogether. We are now driving on grass and heading directly toward another stone wall. Under the tires, I can feel the mud from recent rains. I panic as the wall comes closer and decide to turn up the hill. I don’t dare stop because of the mud.
It doesn’t matter. We’ve barely headed up the hill before the truck is stuck fast in the mud. I try to ease it out but nothing helps. We are definitely stuck.
You may have a cell phone in your pocket but today there is no such thing. The only course of action I can take is to hike out of the woods and find someone with a wall phone. So we head through the woods toward the main road.
It doesn’t take long for my co-pilot to get tired. I swing him up onto my shoulders and let him ride there while I navigate the hill. An hour or so later we reach the highway… and a house… with a phone. The woman who answers the door is willing to let me use it.
I call my co-pilot’s mother. She is not pleased but, thankfully, she knows me well enough to forgive this wandering. Someone will come pick us up.
A few days later a very pregnant friend and I head back to where the truck has been abandoned to see if we can rescue it. We wonder if AAA will come up there to pull it out. When we get close my friend sees an old farmer on his tractor and has a better idea.
He looks us up and down and slowly shakes his head after listening to my story. “If you was boys I wouldn’t help you,” he says. But he lets us climb up on his tractor and gives us a ride to the truck, which he easily pulls out of the muck.
Now, in the beginning, I said it might not be wise to take navigational advice from a four-year-old. Of course, if I didn’t, I wouldn’t have this story to tell.
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