This local wrangler isn’t sweating blocking one whole side of the road to lend a stranded stranger cranking power. Right there is a metaphor for the ages. If that were my truck and horse trailer fifty yards from the center of town with traffic creeping by, I’d be way too nervous to do the right thing with the jumper cables.
Ever hook one up wrong? I did once, helping a driver with a stalled car at a drive-through window at my bank in Austin: the top of my battery exploded with a bang like someone shooting a shotgun next to my ear. I ran into the lobby of the bank shouting, “Where’s the restroom? I have battery acid in my eyes!”—which wasn’t exactly true (although I thought so), but got everyone’s attention. I had it all over my face, at any rate, and flushed my eyes a long, long time. To this day, I can’t remember how I got back home. Even with a partly shattered case, the battery must have had enough juice left to start the car and get me on the road. Don’t try any of this at home, please, but at least you know it can be done.
John Hamilton Farr lives at 7,000 feet in Ranchos de Taos, New Mexico, U.S.A. As New York Times best-selling author James C. Moore tells it, John is “a man attuned to the world who sees it differently than you and I and writes about it with a language and a vision of life that is impossible to ignore.” This JHFARR.COM site is the master writing archive. To email John, please see CONTACT INFO on .png)
Yikes! I know right where that is — not a convenient place for a breakdown! Thank goodness for the friendly (and likely experienced) local who stopped by to help.
I know! It’s really steep. Funny how that doesn’t come through so much in the photo.
I drive up that hill almost daily. Sorry I missed that event. I guess practical help isn’t dead in Taos. Funny how one adjusts to reality. When I first came to Taos, I hated the slow traffic on the main drag. Now I just expect it and take in the human scenery.
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