When I was looking to purchase a vehicle, I knew I wanted something to haul my kayak and bike. I did research. Racks across the roof of a car. Racks above the side of a truck. Kayak in the bed of the truck and a rack securing it to the hitch. I did research, really. And in the end, I decided just strapping it into the bed of the truck, securely, with ratcheting straps would be good enough.
It has gone well enough. No, better than well enough. I have been impressed with myself. My packing and strapping and general tough-macho-throwing-of-the-kayak-into-the-back-of-the-pickupness. I’ve been right impressed with myself. Of course, you know how this story goes. Pride goeth before the fall.
So there I am, in Florida, having had an excellent morning of kayaking and afternoon of working and I think I’ll just run into town and go through a drive-thru for dinner. Real quick like. I’ve made it to town and I’m on a six lane mc-highway trying to cross three lanes of rush hour traffic to do a u-turn. The air is warm. The windows are down. The traffic is noisy but I have the radio turned up loud. Real loud. Because it’s that country song where the girl done wrong sings about smashing up the cheatin cowboy’s car and I do love that song. I wouldn’t admit to singing along with it, but the radio is turned up loud. And then I feel like there will never be a break in traffic and so I better just floor it and go. So I do. I floor the gas, spin the wheel to the left, singing “I took a Louisville slugger to both headlights,” and then I hear a thump, several thumps, fairly akin to an overweight child rolling down stairs, and then there is a loud bang and immediately I know what has happened. The kayak. The straps. My master plan. I pull over onto the side of the road, throw open my driver’s side door and leap out into the street where my red kayak is blocking the outermost lane of traffic. My paddle is a few feet further away. The cans of food which had been behind the kayak are still rolling along in various directions on the highway. A white van stops and a guy with a goatee and Bass Fishing hat gets out, picks up the paddle that is stretched in front of his van, and starts walking toward me. Now, let me take a step away here. I have the lifted pickup truck with dark tinted windows. My door is still open and blaring country music and I am half running down the highway, in shorts, a tank top, no bra, and a baseball cap that says “Hey y’all.” Oh, and I’m barefoot. That’s right. Barefoot. With cans of generic brand spinach and spagettios rolling around me. I pick up the kayak and heave it back to my truck. The man follows carrying my paddle which he puts into the truck bed while adding with a thick long drawl, “You might try some bungee cords on that there boat.”
“Yeah, uh-huh.” I say as I start to re-hook the kayak. I realize what happened. I didn’t hook it back up after my paddle that morning, since I had only planned to drive around the park and not go into town. I had been lazy. “Nice hat.” He says, clearly smirking looking not at my hat but at my tank top. “Thanks for stopping,” I say and I rush back toward my driver’s side and away from him, abandoning the cans of food which have finally stopped rolling and are now being driven over by the traffic which has pulled around the white van. I get back to the door of my truck. Another song has started up, I got friends in low places. A can of spinach has come to a rest just a few feet from my door and I pick it up. The spinach can is dented and scratched, like my kayak, like my pride. I climb back into the truck, shove a bare foot onto the clutch, and pull into traffic singing, “where the whiskey drowns and the beer chases…”
