What a Day!
The day started out OK-
I took Lettie to early band rehearsal, leaving at 7am. I got back, Ji-Won (our Yehudi Menuhin contestant we’re hosting)
had breakfast, and then I took her to UT to get registered for the competition.
As we were driving in, I noticed that every time I applied the brakes, it
sounded first like a little grinding, then like a jet landing on the back right
side of my minivan. I thought “this isn’t normal.” (Shrewd mechanical mind that I have and all.)
After dropping of Ji-Won, I went to Weight Watchers- only to
find I’d gained .4 lbs. Not a happy girl, but resolved to do my walking, which
I’d not done this past week. As I was leaving to come home to work on the
wedding I’ve got tomorrow, I was even more uneasy about the jet landing in my
van, so decided to take it to Just Brakes, where I’d had brake work done (in 2011, as it turns out.) Sure enough,
I needed a brake job. The back right was rubbing metal on metal, which I’m told
is not a good thing. Being basically broke, I wasn’t happy about it, but given
that it is still much less than a monthly car payment, and it had been a bit
over 56,000 miles since the last brake job, I told him to go ahead. Then he
told me it would be at least 3:30 before he finished, which was a problem,
because not only did it mean I wouldn’t get home for the 3 hours of work on
tomorrow’s wedding I’d planned, but it also wouldn’t be done in time for me to
get to UT for the Yehudi Menuhin open events today that started at noon. Paul
at Just Brakes said he could get me a ride to UT if I could get back afterwards,
but that it might take about an hour to get the ride- and I needed to be at UT
in less than an hour.
There was a nice young man and woman who were in the waiting
room with me. From hearing them talk, I knew they were musicians, so I figured “what
the heck, ask them for a ride.” Turns out, they were going not far from UT and
they’d give me a ride. They were part of a band from the NE that is touring.
They played a top club here last night and were headed out for Dallas to play tonight, but they’ll be back
for SX-not sure if as a band or as fans of music, but I hope to run into them
again. Good Samaritans for sure! We got to talking about music, and I told them
about the concert series I coordinate at CPC. They asked if we had mass during
the week, so I told them we’re Presbyterians, but that St. Mary’s is just a
block further north. The girl (I’m lousy at names) grew up in church, and said she
missed singing hymns; so naturally, I invited them to come to CPC during SXSW,
so maybe I will see them again!
So, I get them to let me out at 15th & Red
River-(they needed to go to a club on RR,
and since they’re not familiar w/ Austin,
I figured that would be easy for them to get from there.) I walked over to
the Music Building. As I was walking, I received a
phone call from the school nurse at Lettie’s school. Lettie had gone in around
11 with a bad headache. The nurse gave her the headache meds I’d left for
Lettie, but they didn’t work. About 45 minutes later, she was back in,
complaining about her head and said she felt like she was going to h- and she
did. So, the nurse was asking me to come pick her up.
I had to explain to her that my husband is in California (and his car at the airport), my car was
at Just Brakes with all 4 wheels off and wouldn’t be ready until at least 3:30,
and I was at UT with no way there. She asked about Lettie’s uncle- but he’s in
CA with Mark, and then asked about her aunt, but she’s working full time. She
asked if I didn’t have someone I could ask to go get Lettie and I didn’t. The 1
person I would have asked is in PA, attending her father’s funeral. My other
friends around here all have kids, and I wouldn’t ask them to pick up my sick
kid who could possibly be contagious. The nurse said “she can’t stay here” and
I told her “well, I can’t fly, so until I can get a vehicle, she’ll have to
stay there.” I went on over to the music building, had lunch, told the person
in charge that I was not going to be able to stay for all the opening
festivities, gave them back our tickets for tonight’s opening concert, which
features Anton Nel, who I’ve never gotten to hear live and in person, and left,
walking towards downtown.
I decided to rent the smallest car I could so that I could
pick up Lettie, then go back into Austin,
return the rental and get my van. I thought it was the perfect plan- apparently
it wasn’t.
About this time, I was walking past the UT School of Social
Work, where 2 of my friends are professors. I’d called one earlier to see if
she could give me a ride, but she was in a meeting w/ the dean. My phone was going
dead, and I was still trying to get a car rental, so I went into the School of
Social Work to see if I use their phone to make a couple of calls. (Barbara and Barbara, if they ask you about
your crazy friend, you’ll know who it was.)
Although Enterprise
Rentals SAID they had a car for me (and
it was just going to be $26) when I called for them to come pick me up, the
local office said they couldn’t get me a car til at least 4- by which time I knew
my van would be fixed. I called 3 different offices of Enterprise, same story all around. I wonder
what would have happened had I shown up at their office and said “here’s my
confirmation number, where’s my car?” Believe me, after this weekend is over, I
will be writing to Enterprise
corporate office!
After calling all these rental places, I had to call the
school, which of course, is a long-distance call. I had to go into another
office (thank you Suzanne) to get to
make a long-distance call a-l-l the way to Dripping Springs. I told the lady in
that office – the aforementioned Suzanne- that I’d give her $5 if I could make
this call. After being on the phone and hearing that Lettie was sleeping and
the nurse had calmed down, I hung up, thanked Suzanne and walked out. (Note to self- take envelope with $5 to give
to Barbara A. at church on Sunday for the School of Social Work.)
As I was walking out of the School of Social Work,
my “in the red/dead zone” phone rang. It was Paul at Just Brakes- and it was
only 1:30. He’d put my car in first and I guess put a couple of people on it,
because he said it would be finished in a few minutes. I needed to get to South
Lamar fast, so called a taxi, walked to the corner of MLK & Trinity, as I
told them, and waited, and waited. After about 10 minutes, I realized that the
AT&T Hotel was just up the hill a few blocks and would likely have taxis
waiting there, so I hiked up there. Sure enough, taxis! I’d never been so happy
to see a taxi in my life!
I got in, and away we sprinted- til we got on Lamar, which
was taking about 100 changes of lights to get through a block- well, maybe “only”
6-8, but it was way more than I had patience for. As we sat still in traffic, I
watched the taxi meter climb, so I asked him to turn at the next corner (6th St.)
and go to MoPac and then come into Lamar from the South, which he did. At $30
taxi ride later, we were at Just Brakes, my chariot awaited me, credit card was
whipped out to pay, and I was off and after my baby girl.
She’s now home, resting, our student is staying at UT til 6 tonight, and now that I’ve had the catharsis of writing this, I’m headed out to
the studio to work on the wedding for an hour or so, go get Ji-Won, have dinner, and then back into the studio to finish the wedding.
As all this was going on, I kept thinking “this is horrible”,
“this is hellish” and on and on. Then, as I was seeing some light at the end of
the tunnel and walking up MLK towards the AT&T Hotel and those blessed taxis, I
thought about the people in Syria and in Kiev, and realized how lucky I was
that my big problem was that my car needed new brakes and my daughter was
sleeping peacefully in the safe, warm nurses office at our school. In all of this, I’d gotten
in the aforementioned needed walking, so some good came out of it! And I realized that it is rare that I would
need to handle all this by myself, usually Mark is here to share the load, and I’m
fortunate to have such a good spouse. It’s all about perspective, isn’t it?
