A quantum of solace, or, An adventure, rightly considered
If my car starts up today, then the aggravation of trying to get my car to work last week was a fun little adventure; if my car doesn't start up, it was a tiny tragedy, like a pinhole stroke just wide enough to let slip through the one word you need. Until I go out and try it this morning, my quantum car, Schroedinger's car--neither alive nor dead--remains poised between comedy and tragedy, adventure and inconvenience. (G. K. Chesterton: "An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered.") Between comedy (Sam) and tragedy (Smeagol), I suppose you have epic (Frodo). So here's the heart of my car's saga--I hold it out to you:
Tuesday: I rush to the gym and forget to put extra gas into my car, so when I come back 12 hours later (gym, class, class, union-organizing meeting), the gas line has frozen. I call AAA (I get the correct number from a nearby cop), but my phone dies soon after, so I wait for a few hours in the sub-freezing weather for the battery-man to come. I crack open some chemical glove-warmers I put in my glove-compartment for just such an occasion. The battery-man can't help. (We put in gas, we put in Heet, he suggests I try it another day.) His name is R. Griffin.
Wednesday: I forget my fully-charged phone at home, so when I go down to Hyde Park, and my car doesn't start, I decide to call a tow truck to take my car to a heated garage, so it can thaw, but after 30/45 minutes of waiting, I decide it's not worth it to spend any more time in the snow.
Thursday: I get a triple-A tow truck. The driver's name is Dwight, and we have a nice talk about how terrible things are. He says he believes America is trying to take over the world; I say the American imagination has often presented America as the world. I lock my keys in the car. We meet up with Hassan, who has a lock-out kit. He broke 4 ribs falling off a flatbed tow truck once. At the garage, they take my phone number, and I go sit in a diner and watch Spanish language soap operas until it gets dark. At the garage, my car starts. I fill it with gas, and drive through the early night dark of Chicago's late afternoon.
Friday: I have to go to school to lead a discussion section for the Fantasy and Science Fiction class for which I am one of two TAs--I really enjoyed my first discussion section. My car doesn't start. I debate crawling back into bed. I email the union-organizing group to say I can't petition on campus today. My friend drives me to the El station. (He's the third person I call.) I arrive in time for my discussion class, but there are less people than last week, and I wonder if they didn't enjoy it as much as I did. Discussion doesn't cohere. On the way home, to lift my spirits, languishing under student uninterest and my car's weight, I buy Kelly Link's short story collection, Magic for Beginners, but I don't love the stories I read. Without a car, I slowly diminish my food stores. Winter reclaims its old home. After Life After People, I imagine my car slowly disappearing into rust bones dust; the mortality of things entering through the two-year-plus old scratch in its side--a tiny tragedy, not so wide as the back door, nor so deep as the gas tank, but enough, twill serve. (The end has to start somewhere.) Without starting again, slipping into some car coma, where I left it, it will rest, repose, without solace.
Tuesday: I rush to the gym and forget to put extra gas into my car, so when I come back 12 hours later (gym, class, class, union-organizing meeting), the gas line has frozen. I call AAA (I get the correct number from a nearby cop), but my phone dies soon after, so I wait for a few hours in the sub-freezing weather for the battery-man to come. I crack open some chemical glove-warmers I put in my glove-compartment for just such an occasion. The battery-man can't help. (We put in gas, we put in Heet, he suggests I try it another day.) His name is R. Griffin.
Wednesday: I forget my fully-charged phone at home, so when I go down to Hyde Park, and my car doesn't start, I decide to call a tow truck to take my car to a heated garage, so it can thaw, but after 30/45 minutes of waiting, I decide it's not worth it to spend any more time in the snow.
Thursday: I get a triple-A tow truck. The driver's name is Dwight, and we have a nice talk about how terrible things are. He says he believes America is trying to take over the world; I say the American imagination has often presented America as the world. I lock my keys in the car. We meet up with Hassan, who has a lock-out kit. He broke 4 ribs falling off a flatbed tow truck once. At the garage, they take my phone number, and I go sit in a diner and watch Spanish language soap operas until it gets dark. At the garage, my car starts. I fill it with gas, and drive through the early night dark of Chicago's late afternoon.
Friday: I have to go to school to lead a discussion section for the Fantasy and Science Fiction class for which I am one of two TAs--I really enjoyed my first discussion section. My car doesn't start. I debate crawling back into bed. I email the union-organizing group to say I can't petition on campus today. My friend drives me to the El station. (He's the third person I call.) I arrive in time for my discussion class, but there are less people than last week, and I wonder if they didn't enjoy it as much as I did. Discussion doesn't cohere. On the way home, to lift my spirits, languishing under student uninterest and my car's weight, I buy Kelly Link's short story collection, Magic for Beginners, but I don't love the stories I read. Without a car, I slowly diminish my food stores. Winter reclaims its old home. After Life After People, I imagine my car slowly disappearing into rust bones dust; the mortality of things entering through the two-year-plus old scratch in its side--a tiny tragedy, not so wide as the back door, nor so deep as the gas tank, but enough, twill serve. (The end has to start somewhere.) Without starting again, slipping into some car coma, where I left it, it will rest, repose, without solace.