Like change a tire on the Tappan Zee Bridge!!
By Kathryn Ross
In Tennessee Williams’ play A Streetcar Named Desire protagonist Blanche Dubois says, “I have always been dependent on the kindness of strangers.”
Blanche’s statement isn’t so bleak as it sounds because in some ways all of us are dependent on the kindness of strangers.
My sister Pat and I had a theory. When I was younger, in my late 20s and early 30s the cars I drove weren’t necessarily all that dependable. Oh they were OK when I bought them from dealers like Pal, Milt or Pat, but after getting them home and driving them for a while problems arose.
I’ve always taken the red lights on the dash coming on not so much as a warning, but more of a gentle reminder. Oil, I add when it seems necessary. I’ve always been a little neglectful when it comes to feeding my cars, which may or may not be why I sometimes have trouble with them.
Anyway, my sister and I had a theory. If my car was giving us problems and had stopped, we’d throw the latch on the hood, jump out of the car and place our purses on the roof and open the hood. Sooner than later some guy would come along and ask if we were having car trouble, (No we just we were just airing out the motor.)
He would stick his head under the hood, peer at the motor, giggle some wires and announce something like “There isn’t any gas getting to the carburetor (No Sh-t). Sometimes the handyman could fix the problem, sometimes he couldn’t, sometimes he just shrugged. The theory is that when you put your purse on the roof, someone will come along to help. Sometimes in life we all have to depend upon the kindness of strangers and sometimes we underestimate our own abilities.
I was on a road trip with my great nephew Chris who was about 12 at the time and my very ladylike mother who must have been around 70. I was in my early 40s it was the maiden voyage of our brand-new, pop-up camper. We were crossing the Tappan Zee Bridge after visiting relatives in the area and were on our way to Kennebunkport.
Traffic on the bridge wasn’t too crazy for this country girl more used to single lane traffic. Halfway across the bridge the minivan became difficult to steer and I realized, because I’d experienced it before, that we had a tire rapidly going flat. With lights flashing I pulled off the road and onto the cinders on the side of the multi -lane bridge. I got out and found the deflated tire was on the back passenger side of the van.
It was before cell phones. I had my loved ones in the car and the flat tire was on the inside and I knew how to fix it. I’d taken Driver’s Ed in high school. Being the self-sufficient Girl Scout, I’ve always been, I decided to change the tire. Everyone knows the procedure ,so I won’t explain. I was on my knees in the cinders when I heard Chris praying (he was in Catholic school) while my 70-year-old, lady-like mother was giving the finger (not her middle finger but her pinky finger) to the honking cars rushing by, especially to the tow truck that slowed down and then spend by after seeing the problem was under control.
Job done, I climbed back into the driver’s seat and joined the traffic. Right off the end of the bridge there was a garage. I pulled into it. I was sweaty and my clothes and legs were black with cinder dust. When I climbed out of the van, I was greeted by two, huge, black men. Kind of startling for this country girl who had grown up only seeing black faces staring out of the windows of the migrant farm worker bus when it was parked in front of Umikers. I never met any African Americans until I attended college. As I made my way to the restroom, I asked the two guys to check the lug nuts on the rear right tire because I’d just had to change it.
When I came out the huge mechanics just stared at me. One said, “Ma’am we couldn’t budge those lug nuts they were on so tight!”
Sometimes you depend on the kindness of strangers, other times, when you don’t have your purse handy, you have to depend upon yourself.
Kathryn Ross is a Wellsville lifer, most if it as a writer, journalist, and community activist. You can reach her anytime, kathr_2002@yahoo.com
