Murphy's Ryder Truck

On Labor Day weekend in 1997, I found myself standing at the Ryder Truck Rental Company on West Zero Street in Lincoln, Nebraska. A short distance away loomed a vehicle of ridiculous proportions. A machine which would destroy city streets and everything on or near them. I was sure of it. The rental lady grinned as she handed me the keys. She said something, too. I don't remember what. But why the grin? It covered fully the bottom half of her face. I think she knew something I didn't.

My wife, Anne, was moving to Florida. She wasn't my wife at the time but, by rights of boyfriendhood, I was conscripted to help her get down to the Sunshine State where she was to start a copy editing job at the St. Petersburg Times. I eagerly agreed to the task, of course. Two days alone on the road with Anne had definite appeal. And the route to St. Petersburg traversed at least four states in which I'd never been. Yes, the opportunity certainly had benefits.

But that truck.

Its grill stared at me with a bent brow. Experiencing a new part of the country was one thing. Experiencing it in a vehicle big enough to crush Japanese compacts was something else entirely.

We spent the first day with the rig in Lincoln. I drove to the storage facility where most of Anne's possessions were kept. They were big items, too. Like a bed, a desk, shelves. But when we'd nearly finished the transfer a notion struck me. The rest of Anne's belongings were at my apartment and were minimal in number and size. You know, like a curling iron and such. Nothing that was going to add much bulk to what was already loaded.

"Anne." I said, my voice echoing in the still cavernous trailer. "This truck is less than a third full."

"I know." she said.

"Then why did you rent it?"

She looked at me indignantly. I guess she didn't need a third degree.

"It's Labor Day weekend." she said. "This is the smallest they had."

Well. as long as she'd tried to get something smaller, what more could I ask? By then I was less daunted by the vehicle's size. After all, I'd successfully navigated it from one end of Lincoln to the other and pulled off an impressive backing maneuver into a tight spot between the storage facility and a storm fence. I suspected the rest of the trip could produce nothing more complex.

Anything that can go wrong, however...

Will go wrong.

The truck sat on the street in front of my apartment building over night. We woke early the next morning. Both very groggy. We'd hoped to be on the road by noon, but much was left to do. I climbed into the cab while Anne stood in the driveway of the apartment complex to guide me in.

"Whatever you do, do not hit that Porsche." said Anne.

Yeah, right. Very helpful, honey. As if I hadn't noticed the shiny red sports car parked in the corner of the driveway. I drove the truck into position. We decided I should pull in forwards to make the turn easier.

I made the turn wide, going up onto the lawn to make sure I drove as far away from the Porsche as possible. A tree cut off the lawn side which I also made sure to miss. Maybe a little too sure as my groggy mind wandered a little. I paid no attention to Anne who was yammering and waving her arms like a possessed referee until she stood directly in front of the truck and screamed, "Stop!"

She looked at me with blazing eyes, her breath scant.

"You hit the Porsche!"

I checked the side-view mirror. I hadn't hit the Porsche. It only looked like I had. But I couldn't have hit it, because I hadn't felt "the bump". Didn't hear it, either. I climbed out of the truck to investigate.

I had hit the Porsche.

Fixing this mess occupied the rest of the morning. I took to the task of knocking on almost all the doors at the apartment complex, whereupon, at apartment 14, I met Roger.

Roger loved his Porsche. More than people, I'm sure. I wondered what kind of person would own an expensive German sports car while holed up in the same dump of an apartment building that I recollect as my college dive. Roger was not who I expected. Mostly because he had few teeth. He also had few emotions between his mid-morning breakfast demeanor and a rampaging, angry dingo-like rage.

Fortunately, my apartment building and the Lincoln Police Department resided on opposite banks of the same parking lot. Only a few minutes passed before a man with a state-authorized firearm dangling from his hip arrived to moderate Roger's colorful discourse of my driving ability.

In the back of the officer's squad car, I betrayed my grogginess and spouted a full confession of my general every-day inattentiveness. The officer wrote up a negligent driving ticket. As he tore it from the pad of citation forms, he told me I wouldn't have committed any violation had I simply misjudged the turn.

"Oh." I said.

A small consolation was that the officer also cited Roger for illegal parking.

Two hours after we'd hoped to be on the road, the rest of Anne's possessions were finally on the truck. One last errand and we'd, at last, be on our way.

The St. Petersburg Times was paying for Anne's move to Florida in the form of reimbursement. Which was fine, normally. But Anne had only just recently graduated from college and wasn't exactly "rolling in it". So she had to hock her computer. It was a sterling piece of mid-90s Apple technology which she'd bought brand new for $3,000. Unfortunately, with the little leeway that tends to adjoin snap decisions, she gave it to a secondhand computer store for a mere $600.

Anne was understandably sickened by the transaction, but we left the store with the comfort that we'd now be on our way. I unlocked the passenger side of Anne's car and gingerly helped her in as if she'd just left outpatient surgery. I then went to the driver's side and got in. When I turned the ignition, the missing sound of internal combustion caught me off guard. I'm no car expert, but I do know that when something like that happens, the car is going nowhere without professional tinkering.

I looked at Anne whose slack jaw now accompanied her already dazed expression. "Well, it can't get any worse than this." I said with a smile.

I honestly believed that.

A cousin of Anne's was gracious enough to drop whatever she'd been doing to drive us back to my apartment building. As we climbed into the Ryder truck, I'm sure she left with her own opinion of whether we'd make it to St. Pete or not.

We then drove the truck back to the rental lot where we got a tow dolly to hook up to the already immense vehicle. Great. We could be sure the dolly would stay on the truck, but I was less optimistic that Anne's car would since it was now up to us to attach it.

We returned to the computer store and, utilizing the one auspicious moment in this whole affair, I positioned the rig down a slope leading to the back of the office building. Anne steered her car as I pushed it from the parking stall. A pair of young men, brimming with Midwestern friendliness, dashed out of the store to help me push. Anne aimed the car down the slope. Gravity kicked in and, with precision guidance, she put the car exactly where it needed to be on the dolly. I thanked the men for their help. They scampered back toward the store but, before they went too far, I swallowed sheepishly and summoned them back.

"You guys wouldn't happen to know how to hook this thing up, would you?" I asked.

They looked at each other briefly waiting for the other to talk. I guess they were no mechanical experts themselves.

"Sure." said one. His voice cracked like Peter Brady's and he cleared his throat.

Some things in this world really only matter in appearance. Given a nice facade, quite a number of internally flawed objects can shine like the evening star. Just add a fresh coat of paint or some spackle. A dolly rig is not one of those.

Anne, myself and the two helpful men did our best pit crew imitation as we shared the hook-up instruction manual and tried to avoid colliding into each other. To an outside observe, it probably looked more like a game of monkey in the middle than a hook-up job, but as we stepped back to view our handiwork we all agreed that it at least looked safely fastened. We'd followed the instructions to the last period. If it didn't fall off once we started moving, then it wouldn't fall off at all.

Right?

Well, as they say, anything that can go wrong...

Read part 2 of this adventure here.