(February 1st, 2008, was the day my husband and I moved from California to Wisconsin. Happy anniversary to us.)
We drove.
Not only did we drive, we did it in the dead of winter and we took three cats with us. I wasn't nervous, much. I think that made everyone who knew us and knew we were going even more nervous. Somehow, when people are nervous, I get less nervous. There was a time on the border of Russia when I was stuck on a bus with a lot of people who were very nervous. I think that moment was the calmest I've ever been.
We sent our things (some boxes, two desks, entertainment center, bed, dresser and a small round table) ahead with a moving company. It's the type of moving company that lets you pack and unpack, and just drives it there and drops it off for you. That left only us, the cats, some boxes of china and other sundry items like a suitcase, two sets of hand weights (8 and 20 lbs), cat food, the desktop computer, a little food and a couple audio books on CD packed into our Scion. We left on a Friday.
It was uneventful for the better part of the morning. We left my parents’ house at 6 am, give or take, and drove east, making our way through the dense oak forests of Bangor and highway 20 until we came to interstate 80. The cats were less than impressed with the whole idea of cars, but no one had eaten anyone else’s tail and so we kept on.
Not far into the trip, we encountered first snow. Oaks gave way to pines, which were covered with white. It’s a beautiful stretch of road; the trees are so tall they make an aisle that stretches far overhead. The sky was a pearl colored haze in between the trees that grew brighter as the sun rose until it glowed silver-white.
Then we came to the worst road conditions of the entire trip, going on Interstate 80 over Donner pass to Reno. The trip from Oroville to Reno usually takes about 2-1/2 hours if you go the speed limit, 4-1/2 hours if chains are required. They were. Thirty miles an hour through snowy mountains is dreadful, any way you look at it. Chiefly, it was dreadful because of boredom. We lost some time, but knew we could make it up through Nevada where there is virtually nothing to be seen save for the sky (which is magnificent in the desert).
The sky is only entertaining for so long.
Reno, Elko and the small ranch establishments between slid by with the landscape, while we listened to The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe on audio book. The roads were clear in spite of snow on both sides of the freeway. It was deep enough to cover the smaller sagebrushes, leaving just the dark, bushlike tops visible.
We’d finished the first book by the time we reached Elko, and were halfway into The Magician’s Nephew when one of the cats escaped the carrier and began exploring the front passenger seat. She wiggled her way between the passenger door and large Tupperware container (housing the desktop computer) which was sitting on the passenger seat. I was aware of her, but there wasn’t much I could do while I was driving.
The window beside her started to roll down by itself.
She had stepped on the power window switch. I glanced over and saw the wind tugging the hair on her back up into a miniature black mohawk. I found then there was a lot I could do about her position. I could realize we were going 75 miles an hour and take my foot off the gas. I could reach across the car, over the Tupperware with the computer and the water bottles on top of the Tupperware with one arm. I could remember to look where I was going. I could think faster than the speed of time and depict a mental scenario in which we had already crossed the wide median into oncoming traffic before I’d even turned my head. I could overcorrect.
We hadn’t drifted far, but our back tires hit snow as the front tires swung back onto the road. We lost traction and the car swung around so that I could glimpse through the windshield the cars behind us now heading toward us. I heard some sort of terrible dragging, squealing noise and realized it was the tires. How weird. Jeremy later told someone that he still thought we’d be fine, we’d continue to slow and then come to a stop. I thought we were going to die. I didn’t say so, and my voice wouldn’t have carried anyway over that sound.
We did not come to an immediate stop.
Momentum carried us right to the median, a wide ditch between freeways. The wheels on the passenger side of the car sank into approximately four feet of snow. I felt the car tipping before I turned to my right and saw the ground looming up through the passenger window.
Crap.
Over we went with a thump and a bang, and then another thump as we settled upside down in the snow. Immediately my imagination called to attention all the movies I’d ever seen of cars rolling into water (we weren’t in water) and their inhabitants drowned because they couldn’t break the windows or undo their seatbelts. The windshield, now beneath me, gave a glimpse of solid snow. I couldn’t see out the driver’s side window. It was not unlike being upside down in a tin can. It was hard to breathe. I couldn't undo my seatbelt.
“Jeremy?”
“I’m fine. Are you okay?”
“We’re upside down.”
“Are you okay?”
I didn’t know. “Yes. Are you?”
“Yeah, I think I’m alright. I see blood.”
I tried the seatbelt again, pushing harder this time, and it came free, letting me fall into a cramped heap on the ceiling. Claustrophobia set in immediately, and to escape it I found the fastest way out possible; through the lowered passenger-side window. I was mildly surprised and pleased that it was; windows never worked in the movies when people were trapped inside. I crawled out and sank thigh deep into the snow. One of the rear windows was gone, shattered.
A man with a dark moustache and a knit beanie rounded the rear end of our car. I think he had been calling to us, but I didn't hear anything until I saw his mouth moving and my ears remembered to listen. He looked short, but everyone looks shorter standing in snow. He was asking me if I was okay. I didn't know how to answer. Alive equals okay? I'm okay then. An image of stretchers and ambulances bathed in flashing lights surfaced.
I remembered Jeremy, who by then had gotten a back door open and came to stand beside me. He was bleeding from a cut on his forehead. I wondered briefly how he was bleeding and not dying, but he said it was just a scratch. I looked at it closely, and he was right: Just a scratch between his eyebrows, bleeding briskly down his face. We began to look for the cats. We both knew they were probably dead. They weren't. We were all okay.
Much later, after cleaning out the car, we found that there had been casualties. Some business cards Jeremy had ordered for free plus shipping were mangled beyond repair. A roll of paper towels was swollen with more than its fair share of melted snow. We'd forgotten to retrieve The Magician's Nephew from the CD player before the car was taken to a yard to be assessed for damages. Everything else was none the worse for wear. My china, in boxes, was unscathed. The cat food hadn't even spilled.
We drove.
Not only did we drive, we did it in the dead of winter and we took three cats with us. I wasn't nervous, much. I think that made everyone who knew us and knew we were going even more nervous. Somehow, when people are nervous, I get less nervous. There was a time on the border of Russia when I was stuck on a bus with a lot of people who were very nervous. I think that moment was the calmest I've ever been.
We sent our things (some boxes, two desks, entertainment center, bed, dresser and a small round table) ahead with a moving company. It's the type of moving company that lets you pack and unpack, and just drives it there and drops it off for you. That left only us, the cats, some boxes of china and other sundry items like a suitcase, two sets of hand weights (8 and 20 lbs), cat food, the desktop computer, a little food and a couple audio books on CD packed into our Scion. We left on a Friday.
It was uneventful for the better part of the morning. We left my parents’ house at 6 am, give or take, and drove east, making our way through the dense oak forests of Bangor and highway 20 until we came to interstate 80. The cats were less than impressed with the whole idea of cars, but no one had eaten anyone else’s tail and so we kept on.
Not far into the trip, we encountered first snow. Oaks gave way to pines, which were covered with white. It’s a beautiful stretch of road; the trees are so tall they make an aisle that stretches far overhead. The sky was a pearl colored haze in between the trees that grew brighter as the sun rose until it glowed silver-white.
Then we came to the worst road conditions of the entire trip, going on Interstate 80 over Donner pass to Reno. The trip from Oroville to Reno usually takes about 2-1/2 hours if you go the speed limit, 4-1/2 hours if chains are required. They were. Thirty miles an hour through snowy mountains is dreadful, any way you look at it. Chiefly, it was dreadful because of boredom. We lost some time, but knew we could make it up through Nevada where there is virtually nothing to be seen save for the sky (which is magnificent in the desert).
The sky is only entertaining for so long.
Reno, Elko and the small ranch establishments between slid by with the landscape, while we listened to The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe on audio book. The roads were clear in spite of snow on both sides of the freeway. It was deep enough to cover the smaller sagebrushes, leaving just the dark, bushlike tops visible.
We’d finished the first book by the time we reached Elko, and were halfway into The Magician’s Nephew when one of the cats escaped the carrier and began exploring the front passenger seat. She wiggled her way between the passenger door and large Tupperware container (housing the desktop computer) which was sitting on the passenger seat. I was aware of her, but there wasn’t much I could do while I was driving.
The window beside her started to roll down by itself.
She had stepped on the power window switch. I glanced over and saw the wind tugging the hair on her back up into a miniature black mohawk. I found then there was a lot I could do about her position. I could realize we were going 75 miles an hour and take my foot off the gas. I could reach across the car, over the Tupperware with the computer and the water bottles on top of the Tupperware with one arm. I could remember to look where I was going. I could think faster than the speed of time and depict a mental scenario in which we had already crossed the wide median into oncoming traffic before I’d even turned my head. I could overcorrect.
We hadn’t drifted far, but our back tires hit snow as the front tires swung back onto the road. We lost traction and the car swung around so that I could glimpse through the windshield the cars behind us now heading toward us. I heard some sort of terrible dragging, squealing noise and realized it was the tires. How weird. Jeremy later told someone that he still thought we’d be fine, we’d continue to slow and then come to a stop. I thought we were going to die. I didn’t say so, and my voice wouldn’t have carried anyway over that sound.
We did not come to an immediate stop.
Momentum carried us right to the median, a wide ditch between freeways. The wheels on the passenger side of the car sank into approximately four feet of snow. I felt the car tipping before I turned to my right and saw the ground looming up through the passenger window.
Crap.
Over we went with a thump and a bang, and then another thump as we settled upside down in the snow. Immediately my imagination called to attention all the movies I’d ever seen of cars rolling into water (we weren’t in water) and their inhabitants drowned because they couldn’t break the windows or undo their seatbelts. The windshield, now beneath me, gave a glimpse of solid snow. I couldn’t see out the driver’s side window. It was not unlike being upside down in a tin can. It was hard to breathe. I couldn't undo my seatbelt.
“Jeremy?”
“I’m fine. Are you okay?”
“We’re upside down.”
“Are you okay?”
I didn’t know. “Yes. Are you?”
“Yeah, I think I’m alright. I see blood.”
I tried the seatbelt again, pushing harder this time, and it came free, letting me fall into a cramped heap on the ceiling. Claustrophobia set in immediately, and to escape it I found the fastest way out possible; through the lowered passenger-side window. I was mildly surprised and pleased that it was; windows never worked in the movies when people were trapped inside. I crawled out and sank thigh deep into the snow. One of the rear windows was gone, shattered.
A man with a dark moustache and a knit beanie rounded the rear end of our car. I think he had been calling to us, but I didn't hear anything until I saw his mouth moving and my ears remembered to listen. He looked short, but everyone looks shorter standing in snow. He was asking me if I was okay. I didn't know how to answer. Alive equals okay? I'm okay then. An image of stretchers and ambulances bathed in flashing lights surfaced.
I remembered Jeremy, who by then had gotten a back door open and came to stand beside me. He was bleeding from a cut on his forehead. I wondered briefly how he was bleeding and not dying, but he said it was just a scratch. I looked at it closely, and he was right: Just a scratch between his eyebrows, bleeding briskly down his face. We began to look for the cats. We both knew they were probably dead. They weren't. We were all okay.
Much later, after cleaning out the car, we found that there had been casualties. Some business cards Jeremy had ordered for free plus shipping were mangled beyond repair. A roll of paper towels was swollen with more than its fair share of melted snow. We'd forgotten to retrieve The Magician's Nephew from the CD player before the car was taken to a yard to be assessed for damages. Everything else was none the worse for wear. My china, in boxes, was unscathed. The cat food hadn't even spilled.
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