My Car Exploded

This is the tale I lived to tell.

Fearless reporting, a behind-the-curtains look at how journalism is made — and an unabashed point of view. Welcome to Chills.

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Yep, this is my car.

I’ve been gone for a while. I know that and I’m sorry. I have reasons, not the least of which is that my car exploded.

I’m not exaggerating.

Here’s what happened:

I’d just come off a Seattle highway in the old Subaru I share with my father, and was midway across an overpass when I heard the SUV behind me honking repeatedly: beep beep beep beepbeepbeeep! Lots of short honks that irritated my New Yorker-ass self. It was dark but not yet even 6 p.m. Quickly, I saw that there was a tendril of smoke coming up from the hood like a genie leaving a bottle.

“Damn it,” I thought. “The car is overheating.”

I stopped in my lane — there was only a small sidewalk to go onto, no shoulder. In the split second that I considered whether to try to pull onto the thin strip of sidewalk, the car filled with noxious smoke. I grabbed my bag and bolted. (I know, don’t take your belongings. It was automatic.) As I rounded the front of the car I saw liquid (gasoline? Oil?) pouring from under the hood, feeding an angry fire. As I registered that, the hood shot up in flames at least three feet high.

I ran to the end of the overpass, frantically dialing 911. My hands were shaking badly as I told the dispatcher, “My car is on fire!” Then I called my father who, at the best of times, tells me he can’t understand a word I’m saying on the phone: “Dad! The car is on fire!”

“What do you mean?” he asked, clearly not understanding the magnitude of the situation. As we yell-spoke, I heard the fire engines on their way. Soon, foamy spray would coat the car and the road fully.

As the fire went out, I began to joke with the firemen and cops. My shaking finally eased.

One of them produced a package of paper towels from the trunk of the car, saying, “Look! The paper towels survived!” (The firemen explained that firewalls are built between the front and back of cars.)

Then, as I waited for the tow truck to take the carcass (see what I did there?) to an impound lot, I began squatting and standing and trying every which way to get comfortable on that overpass — my back was aching terribly. By the time the community service officers arrived to drive me home, and pick up my puppy, Xavier, from doggy daycare (post-insane phone call to explain why I was late picking him up), I was in severe pain in my stomach and back.

Without getting into what it was (it’s a kind of pain I’ve had vaguely diagnosed but hadn’t had in a few years), I can just say that I ended up in the hospital on dilaudid. Stress clearly caused this.

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The days following that night were mainly spent sleeping. My body was spent. Then I began to call all kinds of lawyers as my father dealt with the insurance people.

The upshot is that the lawyers told me I would end up spending a lot of money over a lot of years to deal with this, and I’m just not able to do that.

All this is to say that I’m sorry I’ve been absent. I have actually written a few pieces I really like and would normally post here, but have pitched them to editors so that I can make a few hundred dollars if possible. Because that’s journalism today. Even after decades of experience, people like me are still scrounging. On top of that, we’re at the mercy of editors who may or may not reply for days or weeks.

In the meantime, I can only say that I have some pretty interesting posts ready for you if editors choose not to take them.

Most of all, I can say that I feel lucky to be alive.

Thanks for your patience, all.

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