The Long Way Home

It was to be a simple task: drive my husband to Christiansburg, about 45 miles away, to retrieve the new vehicle a friend had purchased the day before.

It's about an hour's drive, unless you're with me, the one with the lead foot and the propensity to "go with the flow" of the other 80 mph drivers. Then you get there much quicker.

However, we were on Interstate 81, which is like driving through a mini-golf course complete with windmills, potholes, and other intriguing traps. Weaving in and out of traffic, I tried not to pay attention to my husband's grip on the overhead handle on the passenger door and his occasional mutterings about speeding.

I-81 is notorious for its hazards. It's one of the most dangerous highways in the state. The highway is two lanes each way, and it now has many times more traffic than it was originally designed to carry. In particular, tractor-trailers travel this road in great numbers. Since the highway has fairly steep grades that the big rigs can't take at speed, traffic frequently slows to a crawl, with backups as long as 3 miles or more not at all unusual.

Fortunately, the southbound lane I was racing down was not all that crowded, but the northbound lane, where I would need to return, was backed up for miles. A tractor trailer on its side had turned the highway into a parking lot.

We discussed a different route for the return trip home with my husband's friend's new car. We decided to go US 460, a much less traveled route.

After we picked up the vehicle, I followed my husband down the highway. I like driving US 460, it's a good road and the traffic is light. However, as we reached other exits, the traffic picked up as folks trapped on I-81 began to siphon themselves off the interstate and onto the less frequented roads.

By the time we reached Salem, I was ready to get back on the interstate and get home. However, to my left, I could see a dark, vicious-looking cloud. My husband called me on the cell. "We're going to take the long way and try to miss that cloud. It might have hail in it," he said. "Follow me."

I knew he didn't want to ding up the new vehicle, and I didn't particularly want to mess mine up, either. But the cloud didn't look like a hail cloud to me. They usually have a little orange in them. But I am a good wife, so I obediently followed him. I thought at first we would get back on the interstate at Exit 140, but no.

Then I thought he was going to make a left turn off of US 460 business and head up Cove Road to Hershberger, but no.

The next thing I knew, we were driving by Roanoke City Fire Station 5. What were we doing in the heart of the city at 3:15 in the afternoon? I had no idea. I kept following him.

He turned left, finally, onto Plantation. I knew where that came out on US 11, but this seemed like a very long way home.

Then he turned right onto some other road that I have traveled only a few times.

And the rain poured.

It rained so hard I could not see him in front of me. I slowed way down because I didn't want to hit him. The water began ponding; cars coming from the other direction sent waves of water over top of my vehicle.

I clung to the steering wheel with both hands, thinking all the while, "We're heading toward Tinker Creek."

My mind leapt back 40 years to the Flood of 1985, when it took me over three hours to get home because of flash flooding and most of Roanoke was underwater, including the area we were driving through. I was on an unfamiliar road. I couldn't see. I couldn't tell what was in front of me. I didn't know where there might be a place to pull off and wait out the storm.

Finally, we neared the train tracks that I thought were coming up, and saw my husband make another right turn on Sanderson, only at the time I didn't realize it was Sanderson because it was raining so hard I couldn't see the sign. I called him. "I can't see to drive, where are we?"

"We're on Sanderson, we're near Jen's house."

"Do you have the lights on on that car? Because I can't see your rear end," I told him. He braked and I told him I could see that, but the lights for simply driving were quite dim. Since the car is silver, I was having a very difficult time seeing it.

It was a new car, so I assumed he just needed to find the right switch, and after a while he did. Then it was easier to see him. The rain also began letting up and I was able to release my death grip on the steering wheel. I was back on familiar turf.

That short task turned into quite the marathon, what with my husband's failed effort to keep the car clean and my fright at being on unfamiliar roads in such a downpour.

Next time it’s a “simple task,” I’m going home the simple way. Mine.

*This post was written in its entirety by a human, aside from spell check and normal things like that.*