Stranded

Due to inclement weather, I left work at 4pm yesterday. My wife and my sister-in-law picked me up at the Metro and headed home. We stuck in traffic a bit so I put on Hong Nhung’s Khu Vuon Yen Tinh (The Quiet Garden) to calm my mind. The vibe was beautiful inside the car despite the sleeting rain outside and the cars weren’t moving along. Suddenly the quiet garden became chaotic. The audio went in and out. The wiper blaze was working with the grandma speed. The lights became dimmer. We pulled to the side to check out my good ole Acura. Nothing seemed to be wrong except we couldn’t start the car again. I knew we were screwed.

I called our insurance for road side assistance. After detecting our location through my cellphone, the representative informed me that we were in a high-alert-winter-storm zone. All the tow trucks only worked on emergency cases. She told me the only thing I could do was called 911. I got out of the car and walked around to see if we could find a gas station or something, but luckily a very nice gentleman offered to give us a ride. We all hopped and he was very generous to dropped us off about half a mile away from my sister-in-law house. I had to pushed his car a couple of times when we got up the hill, but we was quite a good snow driver.

We didn’t get home until 10 something, but we felt very fortunate that someone helped us. I was also glad that my wife decided to left Cong Dao home with grandma instead of going to school. I can’t even imagine what it was like with him out there.

This morning, my wife and I went to to pick up our car. We jumped the battery and the car worked fine. It was my fault for not checking the battery. We got a fine for abandoning our car and two cops came by as I tried to dig the car out. I thought we were going to get another ticket, but the two young cops were actually helped us shoveling and pushing our car out. Cops aren’t so bad after all.

It was definitely not a pleasurable experience, but I felt very fortunate. Thanks to the man who helped us.