Our road trip in the Dodge Colt station wagon, a genuine lemon sold to us by the seemingly affable Mr. Brown, who, in retrospect, was as genuine as a three-dollar bill, was one for the books. Mr. Brown spun a yarn about the car being a little-used gem from his wife, who apparently couldn't drive a stick shift due to her sudden, inexplicable preference for automatics. The truth? The car's innards were swimming in graphite, a detail we naively overlooked, charmed by Mr. Brown's facade of niceness. Our destination: Lone Pine, CA, to visit my Grandma Tessa, armed only with paper maps and the kind of optimism that hadn't yet encountered reality.
Determined to take the scenic route through the desolation of Nevada, I charted a course that included a "shortcut" over Westgard Pass. Maps, however, have a notorious lack of scale when it comes to mountain passes. By the time we realized we needed gas, the only station in sight was as operational as our car was reliable—closed. Against better judgment, we pressed on, greeted by snow that painted a deceptively serene picture.
"Look! Snow!" I exclaimed, trying to keep spirits high as our Colt began to protest—smoking and stuttering like it was auditioning for a role in a disaster film. The road steepened, the snow deepened, and our collective anxiety skyrocketed. Our lone companion was a pickup truck going the opposite direction, leaving behind the only evidence that we weren't the first to regret this route.
With the gas gauge firmly below E, the engine gave a final sigh and we coasted to a halt at Westgard Pass. There, amidst our brewing panic, my wife pointed out a small white cross, illuminated by a stray sunbeam. A "sign", she insisted. Skeptical, but out of options, I turned the key. Miraculously, the car sputtered to life, just enough to get us rolling down the mountain to Big Pine, where we found salvation in the form of a gas station.
And so, thanks to a combination of divine intervention and sheer dumb luck, we lived to tell the tale of our lemon's last stand at Westgard Pass. Scout's honor.