This week, on cue with a testy full moon conjunct my natal Pluto, and a transiting cluster of planets sitting in Aries, my car broke down. Not for the first time but for the final time in our short relationship.
I bought the sensible, 4-door sedan at the height of pandemic pricing in 2022 when I first moved to LA. It was a last-minute purchase. The title was finalized around 11pm at the dealership the day before my rental car was due back. I was freaking out because there were so few cars available and everything was over budget, except for a 2007 Silver Toyota Camry with a defective dashboard that had the texture of a hot gummy bear and a driver-side door with a soft, squishy side panel. I realized then just how upper-middle-class my upbringing was because I had never seen a door, or a dashboard do such a thing.
Despite this fact, I loved my new and first car that I had ever bought with my own money. I called her Athena after the goddess who hid her true value to test the character of great heroes like Odysseus, and spy on potential enemies. A friend of mine, upon seeing her, caught onto her subterfuge right away. “You should go do some crime with this car!” No one would see her coming.
Over the next two years, Athena would be my reliable soldier as I battled through the highways of Los Angeles, and never once got broken into. But slowly, or I guess not so slowly since it was only 2 years, things started to go awry. First, I discovered that the cigarette lighter didn’t work meaning I could never charge my phone. Next, the sun visor on the driver’s side needed to be duct-taped to the ceiling to keep it from hanging limply in my face. Securing it with Velcro didn’t work. When replacing the filters myself, I dislodged something in the glove compartment and haven’t been able to firmly close it since. When I drive too fast over a bump, the drawer opens with a thud like a jaw dropping, paperwork spilling out of its mouth onto the floor.
Later on in New Mexico, the panel holding the lock and the windows got pushed in, I’m pretty sure by the mechanics at Zia Auto Repairs, so that each time I wanted to roll down the window I would have to perform a complex motion of pushing and pulling the window button to open it, or lock the door. Then I got pulled over because the police couldn’t read my license plate, so I filled it in with a Sharpie.
When I left Los Angeles in February to drive across the southwest for my odyssey across the southwest, Athena broke down less than an hour into my trip. This caused a six-hour stop at the bottom of the Grapevine on Highway 5, including two hours spent rattling on the shoulder of a Grapevine curve waiting for the tow truck to arrive.
The breakdown took the wind out of my sails, but in the end, the stop was well-fated. In addition to a new alternator, I got a few repairs that LA mechanics had neglected to perform, including - my LA friends will roll their eyes at how long this took - fixing my cigarette lighter / charging outlet for free.
This was the first of many signs that leaving LA was the right move. Armed with these new reinforcements and an endless stream of podcasts, Athena and I, and my feline companions, hit the road again feeling blessed by good fortune.
Since then I have been happily exploring New Mexico with Athena until this week when, at last, the silver-suited goddess was defeated. There are more ominous signs of trouble in the past few weeks: a failed emissions test, an overpriced quote for a new catalytic converter (Zia! *shakes fist*), and then on the way to work, an electrical short that left me crawling the last few miles to work along Arroyo Hondo shoulder.
During lunch that day, my boss and her wife raise their eyebrows when I say I have plans to change out the catalytic converter myself. “I bought a new one online for only $125!” I announce. More quiet glances, followed by an offer to front me my bonus to pay for repairs or maybe a payment for a new car.
The wisdom and generosity of this well-timed gift is thwarted when I decide instead to trade in my car later that night. I am able to drive to the Santa Fe Toyota, but find it cleared out any decent inventory, thanks to a frenzy prompted by the Trump tariffs recalling Covid-era toilet paper buying. With only two hours to make a decision about a new car, I do what I should have done in 2022, I wait.
Instead, I set my sights on Albuquerque where there is another Toyota dealership with a better inventory. I call AAA to see about a tow on my new upgraded account with 100 miles of free towing, rather than risk another breakdown. I am horrified to find that the new plan I had luckily upgraded to yesterday would unluckily not be available for another week. “But you took my money,” I exclaim. The person on the phone was at a loss.
Determined to make it work without AAA, as much out of principle as anything else, I make a stop at AutoZone on the outskirts of Santa Fe. I decide I will launch the car like a Hail Mary down Highway 25 with the aid of something called Cataclean, a mysterious fluid whose name called to mind French catacombs, cataclysms, and esoteric Catholic rituals. I dump the holy liquid into my gas tank and began to drive.
The magic of Cataclean is taking its desired effect so I pop in a Loretta Lynn CD, and begin singing along. I go walking after midnight, out in the moonlight, just like we used to do. Then a hill, and suddenly the speedometer starts to tumble downwards. I press on the gas, but the harder I do the slower Athena goes. A massive truck grows larger in my rearview mirror. He’s not going to stop, but instead swerves out of the way causing my car to shudder in his wake. He narrowly misses both me and the car to my left. I start to pray.
In defeat I move slowly along the shoulder, hazard lights blinking. I later learn that my car has gone into “limp mode,” a setting that kicks in when there is risk of “real” damage to the car. As a protective measure, the car stops most of its functions and limits its speed to 20 mph, almost like an animal deciding to play dead.
I limp towards the next exit on the Kewa reservation where there is a gas station only 1 mile away. A good omen given this stretch of desolate highway. I roll into the gas station and praise the gods that I have arrived, car intact. Sanity, also mostly intact. I let Athena sit for a few minutes thinking she will restart and we will continue on our way. Except she doesn’t.
At this point, I am in deep with no easy solution. I call AAA again, this time actually desperate, but they won’t budge. I text the salesperson at the Albuquerque dealership and tell him I won’t be able to make it tonight.
Are you stuck? he texts back. We talk briefly on the phone. I try to sound casual and unconcerned as I tell him that I am in Kewa and my car won’t start. To my surprise, and great relief, he offers me both a ride to Santa Fe, and a tow of the car to the dealership. I accept the tow and discover there’s a train station nearby, the New Mexico Rail Runner which plays the Warner Brothers Road Runner sound, meep meep, every time the doors are closing. It’s a 6-minute’s drive.
No longer worried about my ride home or Athena, I call an Uber and wait. And wait. And wait. It’s becoming clear there are no drivers out here. I watch as cars and trucks drive past me in the direction of the train station and think about On The Road. If I were Jack Kerouac, I would stick out my thumb and try to get a ride to the station. I eye an older man in a truck getting ready to leave the gas station, and sense he does not want to be bothered. I look at the train schedule, I have about 20 minutes until the next train leaves.
I walk into the gas station, a parking lot over from where I have left Athena to rest peacefully. After a quick conversation with the very friendly, probably high attendant, I am being introduced to a woman he knows driving back to the reservation with her mom. The train station is on their way.
Her mom is inside buying snacks, but sure they are happy to take me. My offer to Venmo her is dismissed. Her mom returns with sodas and snacks, and with 15 minutes to go, we jump in the car and are off.
In the short car ride, the mom offers that the reason for the snack run is her husband, a senior member of the local tribe who attends regular Friday night meetings. They ask about my car trouble, and I tell them, as if I find it all funny now, the highlights of my evening.
“We’ve been there,” she shares. “We thought for a second you were with the police activity when you first walked up.” She was referring to a couple of squad cars with lights blinking, talking to a couple of gentlemen near an EV charging station. I laugh nervously.
We drive past sand-colored hills covered in dark green desert bushes and gray, leafless trees. It’s still winter out here, but there are occasional sprouts of light green starting to grow. You just have to look closely.
“You think the landscape along the highway is pretty, it’s even better on the back roads,” the daughter says.
In no time, I am at the station with minutes to spare. I offer again to send them money and they wave it away.
On the train, I watch the surface of the world as it flies by. I try to guess what lies beyond my view. I think about the series of events that brought me there. What would have happened if Athena had not given up when she did? The cursed limp mode that had cut off my power for seemingly no reason, it had forced me to surrender at that exact moment. While inconvenient, it had put me in the right place at the right time to get this train home. And the car towed.* And all will be fine, I hope.
*There is more to this story, but I am taking some poetic license with it to save you all the boring details.
Some spooky fog that was only on this one part of the land, despite the single-digits dew point
And finally, a picture of DiDi napping.
