those little spare tires? not such a little thing

I left my house today at 5:30 a.m. for work up north. I left up north around 2:00 this afternoon, thinking I'd finish up a work thing on my way home and be back in my house by 4:00. I pulled into my driveway at 5:24.

Somehow my plans were messed up. Might have been when I missed the exit for the work thing. Or more likely, when I finished up the work thing and got back on the freeway, on an unfamiliar entrance ramp that quickly sent me into 75-mph traffic with the option of swerving underneath that speeding semi next to me or swerving off the road to the right or running smack dab over that piece of tree trunk or dinosaur egg rock or whatever that huge hard thing was that was laying in my lane, that I chose, rightly or not, to run over.

Poor little car. Luckily, the only damage was a flat tire. Not so luckily, I attempted to remove the hubcap for 45 minutes (20 of those minutes spent bending over the tire in my skirt and tights until it occurred to me that it would be easier to change a tire if I could sit on the ground, and I remembered the piece of car carpet that covers the little spare tire compartment that I moved aside in order to get to the little spare tire and the jack and other tire-changing tools, so only 25 minutes were spent sitting on the piece of carpet instead of the dried grass and roadside debris and at least there were no syringes, a plus right?) before the kind Samaritan stopped and offered help to the crying lady with the flat tire and then, in a true show of chivalry, refused to accept anything for his heroism and even followed behind me to make sure I was okay until he waved a big wave and exited the freeway.

I promise, here and now, to never, ever again cast a sidelong glance at fellow drivers who are going too slow on the freeway because they have one of those little spare tires on their right front wheel. I will show only compassion and empathy towards them for what must have been a terrifying, frustrating ordeal.

And I will check my insurance card to make sure that from now on, I have 24-hour roadside assistance.