When I finally wrapped up with writing around 3 a.m., I debated on whether to try and move my Jetta to a different spot in my neighborhood, or to set my alarm for 6:30 and just get up and move it in the morning. I looked out the window, saw the thin layer of snow blanketing the world, and didn't really see any openings around the block. Especially since I didn't feel like bundling up just to make circles and park in the same place, I figured I would just go out in the morning, move my car, and sleep for a couple more hours before going to work at 9:30.
Since I've received a number of $50 tickets from oversleeping, I sprang out of bed promptly at 6:45, tired from a mere three hours of rest. Before I ran out the door, I remembered that crazy things happen to me and my car, so I grabbed my wallet just in case I got pulled over for driving half a block without my license. Ridiculous, I know, but crazier things have happened, so I wanted to be safe and remain legal and out of the courts in 2009.
At 6:50 I started my car up, turned on the heat defroster, reached into the backseat for my snow scraper, and got out into the cold to remove the minimal snow that was on my windshield. Normally I would have just used my windshield wipers to remove that small amount of white dusting, but a year ago I did just that and snapped one of the wipers clean off because of the ice. Yeah. Just exercising caution to not make the same mistakes again!
I finished in two minutes; it was about 11 degrees outside and I wasn't trying to hang out in that kind of weather. When I tried to open the driver's side door, I noticed it was only halfway shut and it was stuck. I tugged on the handle a couple times to no avail, so I hip-bumped the door completely shut and tried again.
Nothing. Completely stuck.
My car has a feature which prevents you from locking yourself out of the car: the only way to lock the driver's side door is by using the key, so I knew I hadn't inadvertently locked the door. The other three doors were all locked, but the driver's side door was not. I tried again and again and again, and it just wasn't budging.
Damn, I thought to myself. The door must be frozen stuck. It was 11 degrees out, after all. Instead of panicking, I ran upstairs and grabbed a bowl of hot water and came back and poured it all over the driver's side door, hoping to thaw it out. No dice.
I texted Linda, my landlord who lives below me with her family, to ask if her handyman husband had any spray on de-icer. She promptly responded that she didn't know if he did, and that she couldn't find out because he was at work and couldn't have his phone on him. She suggested I ask our next-door neighbor, Luis, if he did, since he's always up early.
Luis is a sweet old man who always makes great conversation when we see each other in passing. I rang his doorbell. "Buenos dias!" I said. "My car is running and my driver's side door is frozen shut. Do you have any de-icer?" He said he didn't, but grabbed some tools to try and jack open the door and walked out with me to my car as I explained the situation.
It was 7:15. As Luis worked on getting it open, I noticed a Chicago Police squad car up the block, ticketing the cars that were still parked on the block. I worried for a moment, but as the officer drove down the block and approached me, I waved him down. He pulled up next to me and rolled down his window. "Hi, my car's been running for half an hour and I was just trying to brush the snow off and now the door is frozen shut!" I said before he could get a word out.
"Oh, okay, let's see what's going on," he responded. He promptly stopped his car just ahead of mine and came out to help.
"Hola, senor, como estas?" Officer Galliardo greeted Luis. He was very sweet. We told him what was going on, and he tried the door handle a couple times. "Man, you know, we have to be careful here," the officer said. "I used to own a Jetta, and I know that the handles are not the strongest parts of this model's mechanism." Yeah, no kidding. My passenger side handle had broken off before. He found a useless empty bottle of WD-40 in his trunk. "Well, let's try to pry it open," he said as he came back with more tools and wedges. The three of us tried to pull it open for a minute, and finally Officer G told me, "You know what? Just go sit in the front seat of my car; no sense in you being out here freezing with us."
I hopped in the front, defrosting my fingers on the heat vents and looking around. It was incredibly unexciting as cop cars go. His ToughBook laptop thing was covered with half an inch of papers and forms.
I twittered:
"Classic char- 730 am in the front seat of a cop car while the neighbor and officer try to jimmy open her door.
The officer came back in his car. "We've been trying to get it open and it's not working, so Luis is going back into the house to get a wire hanger because I'm pretty sure it's locked. The thing might be up, but it must have locked because I can't imagine it being stuck like that!" Fair enough.
We chatted some more. I felt like such a dork with my unbrushed teeth, floppy hat, glasses and pajamas. "I hope this all blows over soon; I have to go to work at 9:30!"
"Where do you work?" he asked. I told him it was the Stadium Club at United Center today. "Oh, I know a bunch of guys that work there doing security."
"Yes, a lot of officers, firefighters, and retired cops work with me!"
"I bet you know Lou then, right? He and I were partners for years before he retired."
I stopped. Lou works security at the employee entrance and I spoke to him almost every day. "I love Lou! I am totally his favorite girl in the entire place; he adores me! He's so sweet."
"Aw, really? I love that man," the officer said. "When you see him next tell him Marcos Gallegos says hello!"
It's a tiny, tiny world...
I Twittered.
"Turns out this officer marcos is longtime friends/partners w Lou my favorite security guy at united center!
Officer Gallegos went back out to see how Luis was doing with the hanger: no luck. I was nearly on the brink of despair.
The two of them pried and pulled for a few more minutes. He came back in the car and said, "I've been dispatched to a job, but what I did was call an officer to come down here who has the actual door unlocking tools. Sorry I have to go, but he'll be here in a couple minutes and you can just go inside and stay warm; don't hang out here and freeze!" He was very sweet.
So much for moving my car in five minutes and sleeping for a couple more hours! I went inside and started a pot of coffee and got dressed and ready for work. I also called my manager at the Stadium Club and told him what was going on in case I was late. By this time it was about 8:15 and my car had been running for an hour and a half. I looked out the window, saw a new officer trying to unlock my car, and ran down to see the status.
"Hey, there." He said. "You're the one causing all this trouble this morning?" He smiled.
"Yeah, I don't really know what happened, but thanks for coming out."
"No problem. I got this, so you can go inside and stay warm." With that, I ran back inside to have some breakfast, worried that it might not work. I contemplated taking the train to work. I thought about calling my co-worker to come pick me up, but there was no way I could leave my car running for eight hours with my wallet on the seat! I wouldn't even be able to hop on CTA either since all my cash and credit cards were in my car!
What the hell was I going to do...?
I was finally ready to go around 9. Looking out my window, I saw the officer had taken his tools and left, and rejoiced. I gathered my belongings and walked outside, telling myself that yes, my car was open, and I would just hop in and head to work a little early.
Not so much. The officer had obviously given up after working on it for half an hour.
At this point, I decided I would just have to smash open a little window in the back, unlock the back passenger door, and go to work.
What other options did I have? I was not about to leave my car and entire wallet hanging out for some Chicago hoodlum to scoop, so I went back upstairs, looked up tutorials on how to break a car window, gathered some heavy, pointy tools from the toolbox, took a towel with me, and went back to my car.
By now, it was 9:15, my Jetta had been running for nearly three hours, rush hour period was over, and the sun was high in the sky. Damn!
I put all my belongings on the trunk and decided which heavy metal thing I was going to use to smash open the small back window. I was a little nervous but knew it had to be done.
Before I draped the towel over the window (a suggestion from one website) and prepared to strike, I tried the driver's side door handle once more.
It opened without any resistance.
I almost fainted.
Well. My car was clearly warmed up enough, so I rejoiced for real this time, threw all the crap into the backseat, and drove to work.
As I pulled into the Malcolm X parking lot, Terry, the older man who takes our $2 and gives us a parking receipt, approached my car. My window was frozen shut and I couldn't roll it down (likely because the water I had poured in the cracks made it stick), so I had to open the backseat window to give him my money.
Terry obviously remembered when two years ago, my muffler system was shot and my car sounded like a rice burner. And since I hadn't driven to United Center in a few months, he probably figured I had gotten rid of the car. Not so much.
He laughed as I rolled down the back window. "I thought we retired this thing!" He said.
"No, not yet! Still rollin'!" I responded, smiling. I couldn't even be mad at him. I couldn't even be mad at my car. Even though there's been a ton of dramz with my Jetta over the years, it's not its fault. It has been good to me and at the very least, gives me ridiculous stories to tell. I didn't get a ticket, and most of all, I was thankful for the help of my neighbor and the police officers. All that hassle before sunrise, and I wasn't even late to work! Now if only I could make it on time on dramz-free days. ;)
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