Time to gas up. Should I wait the 10 miles for the big town of Tifton, Georgia or get off at exit 69 on I-75 going south to Florida. I get off. No fanfare of multiple gas and fast food establishments here. Just a Subway attached to a Speedway. Dilapidated is a good word for this conglomeration of buildings: wore out plywood and cheap paint.
I have smelt burnt carbon each time we stop or slow down and so, it is time to check the oil. I pop the hood but decided to fill the gas tank first. A sleek black Mercedes pulls in next to me. Its equally sleek owner jumps out and as I shimmy between the cars I see an alert coiffed pint size yorkie in its bed in the backseat. In the time it takes me to walk from the back to the front of the car I have alerted Charlotte to the dog’s presence, and invented a mythology about car, dog, owner, and his wife.
Back to reality, the oil is down ¾ quart since leaving Chicago. I search for signs of a leak and see a puddle of oil on a flat surface near to what looks like a sensor. It is a tight squeeze stuffing a paper towel down into the area when a young sheriff startles me. “What’s the problem”, he asks. I am not sure, I tell him. He thinks it is best if we confirm what type of fluid it is: anti-freeze or oil.
I cannot get the paper towel down far enough so the he hands me an odd looking screwdriver, but its not, it is an extended key for handcuffs. So he does not have to touch his clients he explains. Another voice surfaces from a gentleman walking to his pickup truck. “Yea”, he says, “VW’s and Subaru’s need the constant additions of parts to keep them going”.
We three agree it smells like oil. Wishful thinking on my part, as other smells would denote outcomes I did not want to contemplate in rural Georgia. Hurrah, when I pull out the towel it is confirmed — oil. I repeat my head-gasket-failing-in-the-West-Virginia-mountains mantra and we quietly speculate. Well, call us if you have a problem the sheriff says as he trots back to his lunch with an equally young woman in a bright orange shirt.
I go into the minimart in search of a quart of oil. I ask the clerk but she is busy in conversation with a large disheveled UPS driver so I go looking. “How is so and so . . . how did the [Superbowl] weekend go?”, he asks her. She responds with a sigh and a downward glance, “Drinking’s tough”. “Hope his liver holds out”, Mr. UPS says as he places various Miss Debbie products on the counter and fingers through the Mr. Peanut’s packets.
When she looks up, I am there with my $4.95 generic 10W-40. Before I leave, I ask if she has a paper funnel and she response, “Yes sir we do.” And with that polite “sir”, I know I am in the South
New Smyrna Beach
Oh Soleil, Oh Aten, Oh Helios, Oh Amaterasu — Hallelujah.
If I could worship you now I would,
At least ‘til Chi-Town is reacquired.
Land of Lincoln cold in his sarcophagus,
Land of gloom,
Land of dread,
Land of disappointment.
March and April and May
Will past before Lincoln’s land commits to the sun.
So no giddiness,
No false hope,
Until warmth.
2/7/2015
