Sometimes teenagers tell the truth.
The latest saga began when my daughter was driving home from Dallas recently. Somewhere between Dallas and College Station, the car stopped. Broken down. Kaput.
She called in a semi-panic. We listened to her describe the symptoms and sounds of the engine.
“Could you be out of gas?” was our first question.
“No! There is still 1/8 of a tank!” she insisted. I’d driven that car many times and knew from experience that even when the gauge said I was empty, I could still go for another fifty miles.
Those of us who were around in the early seventies know how valuable this information is. This was a time when gas was scarce and stations were closed on Sundays. Every person knew exactly how far he or she could go on a tank of gas, down to the half mile, and we planned our trips accordingly.
I remember going to the beach with friends and figuring out if we had enough to take someone home or not. We parked our cars in one spot and didn’t dare waste gas riding up and down the beach.
But the most important piece of information was exactly how far below “Empty” we could go before we really ran out of gas. Of course, to find this out you had to actually run out once, but the knowledge gained was well worth the experience.
So, I knew if the gauge said there was 1/8 of a tank, then running out of gas wasn’t the problem. We went through the list of other possible possibilities, but since this car wasn’t that old, most of the things we came up with were unlikely.
Meanwhile my son, who thankfully had caught a ride home with her, pushed the car about a mile and a half to the nearest gas station. They filled it up and, lo and behold, it started.
My daughter hadn’t been honest. There was no way that gauge said 1/8 of a tank. Boy was I gonna razz her when she got home.
“I swear!” she insisted, after I asked her how come I had never run out of gas.
“Honey, I’ve been driving that car for a year and have gotten below empty dozens of times. Either the gauge is wrong or you’re wrong, and I choose to believe the car.”
Fast forward about a week. I was on my way to work, which is about thirty miles from my home, and I was in this same vehicle. I checked the gas gauge before I took off and there was plenty of gas to get there. Heck, there was enough to go a hundred miles.
About halfway there, the car beeped, indicating I needed to check my gauges. I looked down and saw that the gas gauge said I had about 1/8 of a tank. Still plenty.
I wasn’t even thinking about my daughter’s saga. My stomach didn’t get butterflies, wondering if perhaps this gas gauge might be wrong. With confidence, I continued.
Oh, about thirty seconds after the first warning bell, the car hiccupped.
“What was that?!” I thought to myself. “maybe just the wind.” It WAS a really windy day.
Then it coughed, sputtered, and stopped. Only then did I think about my poor daughter and how I hadn’t believed her. The gas gauge clearly said I sill had 1/8 of a tank, and I was plum out. I coasted as far as I could, but still was at least a mile from any gas station.
Wouldn’t you know that on this particular day, I chose to wear these little flippy sandal things with a really high heel? I couldn’t walk a hundred yards in these things.
My husband came and rescued me, I was 45 minutes late to work, and I’m really full.
From all that crow I had to eat, you know.
