I know I’ve talked often about Randy’s deep love of the sand dunes—his passion for riding fast things in the sand and pitching sand-filled tents and cooking sand-infused cuisine—and likewise I believe I’ve mentioned that this isn’t a passion I particularly share. The first few times I went quasi-willingly because no one bothered to sit down and give me a quick run through of the fourteen hundred excruciating ways I was likely—nay, expected—to die out there. But my tiptoeing sense of self-preservation only allows for me to be surrounded by eleven horrifying modes of certain destruction at one time (Disneyland, for example), so a few years ago I stopped trying to trick the reaper and I began opting out entirely.

It appears as though Randy, however, has this crazy idea that couples who negotiate interests on behalf of their partners and make small sacrifices for the sake of the relationship end up stronger in the long run. And while I begrudgingly agree with this theory, I don’t remember reading in the Guide To Kicking And Shoving Your Relationship Into Another Year that these “shared interests” should necessarily include a) a very expensive and unconscious helicopter ride, b) being within thirty feet of one another, or c) me not doing exactly what I want twenty-four hours a day. Frankly I would have appreciated hearing about this whole “doing shit together” outline a few years ago before I’d put a fire under my Growing Vaguely Stronger Through Sex plan. Would have saved me a lot of spreadsheet work. Is all.

But Randy, in a valiant effort to convince me to give the sand dunes another shot, made the exorbitant and executive decision to parlay the family’s ATV supply into a sand rail. I don't want to paint myself as the catalyst; Randy really wanted this thing. It’s fast and loud and purple—everything he looks for in a woman. I mean a roller coaster. I mean a… whatever. Secondly, all of his kids were totally into it. They love riding ATVs, too, because they all boast coordination skills above level “platypus” and they have nice-sized heads that fit inside helmets, and a sand car was the natural progression of that love. Not—as I justified it— a tidy way for us to snap our necks in one big group rather than individually. But in addition to those two factors there did exist the added bonus that I would no longer be responsible for my own well-being on an ATV and Randy, all too aware of how much this platypus enjoys a good spontaneous open-eyed nap, knew this would be a huge selling point. Just strap me in and go. Like a road trip, only faster. Like a dinner party, only without the giant stroller.

So I was in. Everyone was so excited and everything, not to mention the fact that I had personally endorsed this purchase wholeheartedly. Naively secure in the knowledge that Randy’s tendency to weigh costly decisions often spins him off-topic completely (a four-year conversation about having the backyard professionally landscaped has so far resulted in five sets of blueprints, eight gallons of weed killer, three frenzied mentions of an orange tree orchard, and new purple acrylic glasses from Costco), I rah-rahhed and thumbs upped and hive fived. Imagine my surprise when he actually came home one day with a sand rail and not a lightly-used treadmill or sixty tiny orange trees. Fool me once, right?

And it wasn’t so bad out there, really. I mean, it was still windy and crappy and loud as shit like I remembered, and the sun still beat down for an unrelenting thirty-two hours at a time, and camping in the endless sand was still like being tossed in a giant Ziploc bag full of copier toner but other than that, other than wanting to punch Mother Nature in the face every waking second, it wasn’t so bad. And there was the car. The car was going to be awesome. I was excited about the car.

Randy and his son, Chris, topped off the oil and the gas and whatever else gets poured in cars and the three of us jumped in for the first ride. My renowned puker status had earned me a front seat position (it’s about time this debilitating motion sickness deal started throwing me some kick backs) and while Randy arranged himself behind the wheel, Chris made sure my five-point harness was tight. Then we were off.

So there’s not really any talking while the car is running because the engine makes the same noise an F5 tornado makes when it’s scared. As we started off, wide-eyed and silent, Randy figuring out the clutch in one sudden, breathtaking acceleration, it dawned on me that I was now trusting Randy to keep me alive while racing up and down mountainous dunes at speeds exceeding one hundred miles an hour in a vehicle so lacking in visible support structures that the phrase “keep your hands inside” necessarily meant that your hands had to be in your mouth. And while I’m clearly a fan of passing the personal responsibility buck, I decided—as we crested over the top of a dune and shot down the other side at five times the speed of anything, ever—that if I’m going to cash it out in the desert it’s going to be because of my own ridiculous ineptitude—not because Captain ADHD got distracted by a loose balloon.

As it turns out my little change of heart revelation didn’t really matter. Before I could scream STOP or throw up on myself or do anything, Randy made that noise people make when their personal command centers go offline. We all do it, make an involuntary noise when shit starts falling down faster than we can register. My noise sounds like “nurg”. Randy’s noise is kind of a stuttering “uh-uh-uh!” thing. I heard him start “uh-uh”-ing and I immediately closed my eyes and shoved my hands back in my mouth because Randy’s brain had just shorted out. Given our current circumstance, that meant we were all probably about to die.

That was right about the time we started rolling. I don’t remember being scared, particularly, but I do recall feeling an overwhelming sense of exasperation. I once dated a guy who couldn’t have more than three cocktails at a party before he started whipping out his junk, and my reaction to that, to having to be on constant Ball Patrol, was oddly similar to my reaction to this. Like the whole flip was one giant eye roll. When the car stopped rolling and came to rest on its passenger side—my side—is when I started to panic. There aren’t any window panes or panels or anything, and so the entire weight of the car was pressing down into the sand on my side, and because I was harnessed in I was also being pressed into the sand. Like, my head. Where the oxygen goes in.

I heard Christopher from the backseat, so level-headed and logical, calmly asking if everyone was okay. He then promptly swallowed all logic and, taking a cue from Jerry Bruckheimer, announced matter-of-factly that the car was leaking gasoline and we were all going to burn to death in a fiery explosion. Being a child of Randy’s (and thus dexterous as a gypsy magician) it took him exactly three point two seconds to extract himself, dangling and sideways, from his harness and shimmy out of the car. Perhaps he knew that I had been way too busy staring off into the distance with my mouth open before we left to pay attention to how the harness worked, or perhaps he simply remembered that platypi have no hands; either way, he came around to where I was slowly smothering to death and freed me from the seat as Randy crawled through the windshield.

We all stood there around the dripping carcass, panting, sand in our everything, Randy apologizing. I hugged him. Goofball. Of course you’re sorry, you were IN THE CAR. Once we’d established the most important thing, that everyone was okay, we moved down the list to the most expensive thing. The car. Surprisingly enough the car was not as damaged as you might imagine after rolling twice. It lost its fin and the radiator got banged up but after it was righted, towed to camp, and given some basic attention it actually started. Proving to me once and for all that there is no god.

“I promise,” Randy said, trying to get me back in it. “I won’t roll it again.”

“It wouldn’t be very smart to roll it again,” I justified. “Two rolls in one day would make it way too obvious that you’re trying to kill me.”

I did get back in the car. I didn’t enjoy it and I was scared shitless the whole time, but I did it.

“See?” Randy said at the end of Trip Number Two, slowing the car to a stop and turning off the ignition instead of just plowing it into the side of a mountain like I was bracing for. “They don’t roll over every time.”

True, they don’t. Relying solely on my personal experience, they only roll fifty percent of the time. I opted out of trying for thirty-three percent. Too much like flipping a coin, I reasoned, only if you get tails you explode.

I guess if there’s any good news here it’s that I didn’t once get carsick. Apparently constantly calculating the odds of my death and trying to choke down the sobs really took my mind off my stomach. Maybe if I can convince a pilot to fly his plane into the ocean it’ll take care of my airsick problem.

 
¶ posted by Erin on Saturday, March 10, 2007