Making headway

On a craft so large, it can feel as though you’re not even moving. (SDASM Archives)

Recently, I had a doctor’s appointment to go to in another city because we live at the edge of the earth.

In preparation for this three-hour round trip, I took my car to the shop.

The mechanic came back with a list of codes so long that he didn’t bother to check all of them. “This car is not safe to drive,” he said. And the implication was that it wasn’t worth fixing.

Okay. Well, luckily we have a second vehicle — a truck. But on the Friday afternoon before my Monday doctor’s appointment, when I went to use the truck for an errand, I put what I thought was the spare key into the ignition and tripped an anti-theft lock. The truck wouldn’t start. After much research and attempts to get it running, our only option was to get it towed to the dealer and wait until Monday to have it looked at. (Of course, these things always happen at 5 PM on Friday.)

So how was I going to get to my appointment? I looked for rental cars nearby. Nothing. Uber doesn’t exist here. My mother-in-law happened to be visiting, though, and she was leaving the next day. I figured I could ride with her to my parents’ house about two hours away and then use their spare vehicle to get to my appointment, which would then be only about 40 minutes away. I’d figure out later how I was going to get back home.

So on Saturday afternoon, we headed down to my hometown. I had a quiet weekend alone in my parents’ house (they happened to be away). I got some groceries and visited my brother and his family.

And on Monday morning, when I went to start the car that I had been using all weekend, there was only clicking. It wouldn’t start. A third vehicle had failed me.

Eventually, I was able to get it started with the help of an electric charger. I made it safely to and from the appointment (albeit an hour late), but that turned out to be sheer luck. A couple of days later, the alternator officially went, and the car has been in the shop ever since.

I refuse to ascribe any divine significance to this farcical amount of car trouble. Nor do I believe that it was caused by Mercury in retrograde. Things happen with old cars.

Of course, things can happen with new cars, too. Though I might carry on for long stretches of time under the illusion that I’m in control of my life and what happens in it, I’m perpetually at the mercy of broken machines, illness, weather, and any number of other random events. I can fight that reality, or I can accept it and grow from these difficult experiences.

Naturally, I prefer when things go the way I planned. I find comfort in the sense that I’m making progress in my life. But I have had to routinely update my understanding of what progress means in order to comprehend the absurd setbacks that human beings can experience. What good is it to have tidied your house yesterday if a hurricane-induced flood can ruin it today? How do you recover from that?

In such a situation, what you thought was progress has been wiped away. All you are left with is what you learned and how you grew. A deepened resilience, forged in suffering.

As for me, it was annoying to lose several hours of my week navigating my various vehicle problems. I didn’t move forward on any of the projects that are meaningful to me because I was dealing with this unanticipated, unwelcome project.

But I gain perspective when I think about the people who confront life-threatening injuries or illnesses and must spend months or years dedicated solely to healing and adapting.

These types of struggles potentially have a spiritual benefit, if only because all struggles do. And that’s the only place I can go to find meaning in them.

After a couple of weeks of dealing with car problems, doctor’s appointments, and other logistical challenges, I am feeling a little more on top of things. That’s good — it will allow me to be fairly well prepared when the next storm hits. Inevitably, it will. I’ll be less frustrated if I expect it.

When I arrived at my parents’ house that Saturday, there was a flock of geese flying in a V overhead. The wind was so strong that they were struggling to make any headway at all — they were moving more to the side than forward. Watching them, I could relate.

But what were they going to do? Wait it out? Give up? They’re geese. They just kept trying.

That’s what I can do, too.