Broke Down In New Orleans

It was 2003 and everyone was hotly anticipating the sequel to the amazing film the Matrix. Me and my friends were no exception to this so when I heard that the film was playing at the Imax theater in New Orleans my friends and I made plans and bought tickets.

At the time I owned two cars. A 2001 Ford Explorer Sport Trac, which I will get around to talking about one of these days, and a 1996 Ford Contour. I had a Mazda Miata for a little while and when my dad sold it I complained that now I did not have an “economical option” to drive over my souped up Sport Trac and its abysmal gas mileage. The truth was that I had grown quite fond of the little sports car and had I known Dad was selling it I would have tried to buy it myself. My Dad’s response was to give me the Contour that we bought from my family for almost nothing. This was of course because it was broken and after a few repairs to the transmission the car was mine in all its glory. Let it be known kids, be honest to your parents or you too may be gifted a car out of context.

True to my request though the car did get great gas mileage and it did have four doors and a rear seat which the little Miata did not have. I decided to make the most of the situation and drove the car just as I had said I would. I tell you all this because when it came time for the trip to New Orleans, I decided to take the little car and my friends decided to ride with me to save some money. Little did we know that this would be a big mistake.

The trip to New Orleans was free of incident and the car performed as it always had, completely average. When we arrived, we paid for parking, walked to the theater and “enjoyed” the film. Maybe the disappointing feeling in our stomachs was mere foreshadowing of what was to come. It was dark when we left the theater and walked back to the car. We piled in and I turned the key and while the car did start it made an uncomfortable and unholy noise. Startled, I turned the car off immediately, popped the hood and examined the dimly lit engine bay under the streetlight. I could see no foul play, but upon cranking the engine again the horrible sound continued. I was over 100 miles from home in New Orleans after dark. To make matters worse my parents were on vacation 600 miles away in Orlando. I had to make a choice and frankly I chose poorly.

The car pulled out of the parking lot, but I could tell it was in a bad way. The engine was severely down on power and the clanging, clacking sound from the engine grew worse as I tried to build speed. I had already called a friend who was on stand-by with a truck and trailer, but my immediate goal was to at least get out of New Orleans and the dimly lit parking area. I prayed for providence as we pulled onto the interstate. My top speed was limited to about 20 miles per hour. I knew we were not going to get far. “Just a few miles,” I thought, hold on just a few miles. But then things got worse.

Traffic jam, miles and miles of cars all moving at 2 miles per hour tops. The little car just could not take it and the engine sounded like it was going to chew itself apart and finally died. I put the car in neutral and the three of us pushed it on the bridge overpass out of New Orleans with the flow of the traffic. The source of the jam was a car accident about a mile from us and when we arrived at the accident it was next to a long sloping ramp that led under the bridge and to a gas station. We pushed the car into the caution triangle just past the ramp exit and watched as the wreck was being cleaned up. We had gone five miles. I asked the police officers if there was a wrecker that was not being used that could tow us down the hill and he pointed to a gentleman across the street. I walked over and convinced him to help us but when I returned to my friends to explain they asked what wrecker. I turned and he was gone. The police had pulled out as well and suddenly the slow stream of cars turned into a raging torrent. The only option left to us was to wait for an opening and try to push the car up then down the ramp to the gas station at the bottom. I looked down the ramp. The gas station was close, but I would have to climb a small incline to park at the station.

We steeled ourselves and began pushing again. Faster we moved and the car began to pick up speed thanks to the hill and our own efforts. Soon I was struggling to keep up with the car and jumped in the open door shouting to my friends, “I'll see you guys at the bottom.” The car still built-up speed down the long curving ramp and as I coasted under the overpass I thought, “I’m going to make it.” As I turned heading up the hill to the gas station the speed dropped alarmingly, it was steeper than I thought. The front wheels rolled onto level ground and the car stopped. I threw open the door braced against the door frame and pushed with all my strength.

Standing by the car holding the pillar of the door frame I realized that despite the small size of the Contour I could not push against gravity and the best I could manage alone on the slope was to hold the car in place. But not for long, I was already growing tired, and I suddenly was aware of the danger I was in. I had to hold on till my friends made it down the ramp or the car was lost into the street, and I was very likely to get run over in the process. Suddenly I felt a hard thud on the bumper and the car rolled forward slightly. I looked back and a man had run from the gas station and put his shoulder to the rear bumper and was pushing the car with me. We heaved together with all our might and the car continued to climb the hill.

I leaned over the top of the car exhausted, panting from the exertion. My new friends also leaned over the trunk panting as well. Before I could say thank you, he asked me breathlessly, “do you have any jumper cables?” I shook my head no and he responded “damn” and made to walk away. I stopped him thanking him a thousand times and we laughed at our shared misfortune. My friends made it down the hill and helped me push the car into an empty parking spot. A couple of hours later and the car was loaded on a trailer headed home and we were all grateful that we had survived.

The car's timing chain had come off when I started the car in the parking lot, and it was a miracle that the car moved at all. My dad and I replaced the timing chain ourselves and I drove the car off and on for another two years before I finally let the old car go. My future wife nicknamed the old car the Mighty Contour, ironically of course but the old beige monster never let me down again.