After the busted windshield, I drive in silence, without tantrum or tears.  Maybe the naysayers were right.

            “Your truck is gonna be messed up bad when you get off that road,” they said.  “Your paint job is gonna be trashed.  I wouldn’t take my truck on that trip.”

            I’ve spent 18 years trying to make Shelley better, smoother, prettier.  How dare I put her on this God-forsaken road in the middle of nowhere. 

            Now, every time I see a dust cloud in the distance, a lump forms in my throat.  Maybe another busted glass, or dented fender, or broken headlight.  And with 700 miles to go, we haven’t seen the worst of this gravel road.  Will Shelley be able to climb those 12-percent grades I read about?  Will the constant bouncing strain her mechanicals?  Once, I saw a junkyard transmission with its case broken in half.  Maybe the strain will crack Shelley’s transmission wide open, too.  Door panel and window channel screws are already backing out from the vibration.  Who knows what engine screws are shaking loose that could strand us in the wilderness.

            I knew this could happen.  Common sense tells you flying rocks can be hazardous to your vehicle, and the speed of those pipeline service semi-trucks is legendary.  But I was overcome with a sense of  “it won’t happen to me,” which has been a required mindset to risk Shelley on this trip of a lifetime.

            “So…” said David as he gestured toward the busted windshield.  “Does that make you mad?”

Here's when Shelley and I crossed into Canada for the first time:

           “Unlock the camper, would you please?” The Canadian border agent was pleasant, but her tone suggested she’d just as soon twist an arm behind my back and throw me against a wall like an inner city drug thug.  

            “Step right over there and wait sir.” She pointed me toward the curb at Shelley’s front bumper.  I paced for a few minutes twiddling my thumbs and trying to look innocent while the lady searched.  She appeared to be going through every single bag of spare hardware, every box of connectors, tapes, clips, tools, and screws, every suitcase of clothing, including my wash bag with dirty undies, every single thing I had packed to survive eight weeks on the road.  I remembered that bag of a hundred rifle cartridges David had packed in his old army duffle bag, and also that Walking Tall axe handle John Lee had given me as a souvenir from the Sheriff Buford Pusser museum in Adams, Tennessee.  John had had the sheriff’s daughter autograph the head basher, then he stained, shined, and presented it to Shelley and me as a good luck charm.  Maybe they had seen those 1970’s Walking Tall movies here in Canada.  Would such lethality raise a warning flag to this rummaging officer? 

            After five minutes, I got bored playing innocent and made myself comfortable sitting on the concrete curb beside a grease spot.   Five minutes became fifteen.  Fifteen became thirty. 

            “Sir?” She motioned for me with an accusatory finger. 

            I stepped around toward her.

            “What are these?” she asked, pointing to the syringes in my fix-it kit. 

            “Oh, that’s what I use to oil the generator.  They’re very handy.  The generator has tiny grease cups. It’s a very old truck.”  Those grease cups were the size of a pea, and were located far down on the generator, beside Shelley’s engine.  Oiling them had been a problem until I found that hypodermic syringes, minus the needle, were perfect for sucking up a few drops of motor oil from the oil bottle cap into which it had been poured, and then injecting the drops into the generator cups with surgical precision.  I didn’t tell her what Mikey, the generator technician back in Texas had said about his having rebuilt the unit with modern greaseless bearings and that the old grease cups were no longer necessary, even though they remained on the generator housing.  I could still show her those tiny grease cups, and even inject a few drops of oil to prove my story if she wanted.