A Series of Unfortunate Decisions

Spending a total of about 13 hours on the road Wednesday and Thursday driving back to Denver gave me plenty of time to think about the nightmare that was my trip to Phoenix. While I remain an atheist, I can't help but wonder if there is still some underlying clockwork in the way the universe works, because I clearly see how Point A led to Point B which led to Point C and so on. (Or maybe it's only that hindsight is just 20/20.)

About a year ago, when the first bit of freezing weather hit Denver, I noticed that my car had started leaking fluid. I wasn't exactly sure what it was, so I took it into the MINI dealer to have it checked out.

Turns out there were two leaks, as well as a cracked strut mount. Thankfully my Geico mechanical breakdown insurance was willing to cover all three items, but with a separate $250 deductible for each. I didn't have an extra $750 laying around, so I opted for the strut mount (a safety issue) and the power steering leak—especially after they told me the coolant leak around the thermostat wasn't that bad, and I'd be fine for a while as long as I kept the reservoir topped off.

Well, the weather warmed up and the coolant leak stopped. I had the car in for service for another matter last summer, and they noted the leak, but also said it didn't appear to be active—but that it should still be repaired.

First bad decision: choosing to ignore the recommendation when I actually had the money to get that leak fixed.

Of course, once the first freeze hit this year, the leak returned. It wasn't any worse than it had been previously, so I just kept topping off the reservoir as I had last winter.

Second bad decision: Insisting on driving to Phoenix instead of flying. Ben kept telling me I should fly and just rent a car when I got down there. But I kept thinking that if we were really going to end up moving dad into a group home, that meant going through his house and pulling whatever I wanted to bring back with me and it would be so much easier to just drive it back rather than attempt to ship it.

Third bad decision: only bringing enough of my meds to cover the expected trip duration of five days, and in the flurry of rushed activity that started this whole ordeal, forgetting to pick up a refill of one of the more important ones (going off with only two days worth) before I left.

But other things also seemed to be working behind the scenes in my favor. Even though Geico refused to cover the starter replacement because they said the unrepaired coolant leak contributed to the failure in Phoenix, a week earlier I'd finally gotten around to opening new checking and savings accounts at a local credit union (I'd been using my Phoenix accounts all this time), where I was given a $1000 overdraft line of credit that doesn't have to be repaid immediately. The final bill for replacing the starter and thermostat came to $950.

And as my very wise friend Cindy said after it seemed storm after storm was rolling through my expected route home, "Maybe this breakdown happened when it did to keep you in Phoenix a few extra days so you don't end up skidding off an icy mountain road to your death."

That really got me thinking, and I was finally able to accept the situation. Yeah, I still wasn't happy about it, and I was losing almost a full week of work (I did have a bit of PTO remaining for the year), but the most important thing in my mind now was to stop bitching about what life had thrown me and simply do whatever was necessary to ensure that I got back to my Ben safely.

On my last day in Phoenix, I was supposed to tour a few facilities with the adult care coordinator my sister was working with, but thankfully he called that morning and had to cancel because of a sick child ("Everyone I know has been down with this horrible stomach bug that keeps you in bed for days.")

Bullet dodged. The last thing I needed after everything else that had happened was to come down sick.

My sister met up with him the next day.

They located a suitable facility, and Dad is now placed and settled—if not happy—in a group home and is out of the toxic environment he had been living in.

 

And continuing to keep my personal safety in mind, I decided to take the longer—but sure to be drier—southerly route back to Denver, driving through Tucson and into New Mexico on I-10 to meet up with I-25 in Las Cruces.

Other than running into a dust storm that lasted from outside Deming to north of Las Cruces…

…the entire route (including Raton Pass, which had been a major worry for ice and snow) was uneventful, and for the most part, completely dry.  In fact, by the time I reached Colorado Springs you couldn't even tell that the snowpocalypse that the fear-mongering Weather Channel had dubbed Draco, had even passed through.

(As an aside, I still say New Mexico needs to change its state motto from Land of Enchantment to Land of Neverending Road Construction.)

And of course, now that I'm home, Ben is about to get on the plane that was supposed to take us to both to Phoenix for Christmas.

But you know what the worst part about all this was? Nothing I did while I was down there could not have waited until next week. Simply put, my sister panicked. I ran two errands to request Dad's medical records, and I tossed out a huge amount of crap from his mobile home, a job that will fully take weeks—if not months—to complete.

I was greeted with a hero's welcome—and a BSOD on one of the reception PCs—upon my return to work yesterday, and I can honestly say I never felt so glad to be back.

I can't say that I am yet ready to fully embrace being Coloradan, but this trip has shown in stark terms that I am no longer an Arizonan. Much like when I was living in San Francisco and returned from visits to Phoenix, the moment I crossed that state line I felt a sense of elation that told me even though many hours remained until I crossed my doorstep, I was finally back home.