The Race is On (Florida Boating, Post 37)

Friday, February 26

On Thursday afternoon, we arrived at our chosen truck stop earlier than expected. We considered going on for another hour or two, but we didn’t want to spend the night on the road anywhere near El Paso. So instead, we stopped early and we spent the late afternoon relaxing in the enormous gravel parking lot.

It was a decision we later almost regretted, but at the time I enjoyed resting in the remaining bit of sun and talking with Serenity – we usually have a regular Thursday afternoon phone call. And Laura calls on Saturdays 🙂 I’ve got good kids.

Friday morning started abruptly when I checked my phone shortly after waking up. Our credit card company was inquiring about a suspicious purchase attempt at midnight. “Was this you? YES or NO?” $22 at some place I’d never heard of. Groggily, we tried to think.

If I typed “Yes”, a criminal could have access to our credit number. If I typed, “No”, they would immediately cancel our card. We use that card for everything. For too many things. For gas purchases, for online purchases, to pay utility bills, everything.

We had been ordering a lot of weird things for the boat, from vendors I had never heard of. Could it be one of them, finally putting a batch of charges through at an odd hour of night? Also we had been in the Florida Keys and in Houston, buying gas at places with crazy-sounding names. Could it have been one of those unfamiliar gas stations?

John googled the name of the vendor. They sell air guns? Tactical knives? Doesn’t sound like us. Perhaps it’s a place that would have boat parts? No. John said, no. Not us. I opened the text from our bank and typed, “No”. The card was instantly canceled.

Do we even have another credit card with us? If not, John thought we probably had enough cash with us for gas to get home, and we had plenty of food in the van. We dug through our luggage and John found a credit card associated with an old account we never use. He called to activate our never-before-used card, and we got on our way.

As John drove through unending West Texas, I got online to change the credit card number – everywhere. The phone company, the internet company, the storage unit; many, many places would attempt to automatically debit that card when bills came due, most within the next few days as the end of the month approached.

Suddenly, in midst of all that logging in and fielding verification codes pinging my phone, I got an unexpected ping. “Notice from DOH to Kristina: vaccine is now available at a location near you, sign-up is on a first-come, first-serve basis…”

They sent my code! I had a code! In order to get vaccinated in New Mexico, you have to sign up online and then wait and wait, and then eventually you get a code. Once you get a code you can schedule an appointment, but appointments fill fast. I had heard of people with codes trying for days and weeks to actually find an available appointment. I knew I had to act immediately. I got online and there were two appointments left, 1:00 and 1:30 at a Walgreens in Albuquerque. Nothing available the next day, or any day after that, just 1:00 or 1:30 today. That or nothing. I grabbed the 1:30 before it disappeared. But how would we ever get to Albuquerque in time? 

We were deep in West Texas, heading toward Tucson. We were at least 5 hours from Albuquerque. We would be over an hour late. Should we turn north at Las Cruces and drive several hours out of our way up to Albuquerque, not knowing whether they would take me so late? Would they have already given my shot away?

As we approached Las Cruces, our decision point, I gave them a call. At first, I selected the phone tree options for those with covid vaccination related questions. That call went nowhere – just some pre-recorded messages. I had to somehow reach the local Walgreens store and convince an employee at that store to talk to me. 

I tried again, this time answering the phone tree questions erroneously, as if I wasn’t calling about covid. I eventually reached someone at the store. I tried to turn on the charm (something I’m not very good at). I begged, cajoled and sweet-talked (also things I’m not very good at). She put me on hold. I got another person. I gave her my same desperate appeal. I’m in Las Cruces. I’m on my way, please wait for me, I’m coming.

She said I absolutely had to be there by the last appointment at 3:00. Our estimate of our arrival time ranged from 2:44 to 3:05. I begged her to give us to 3:05. We turned north toward Albuquerque – we were committed now.

Just past Las Cruces, google maps suddenly started trying to route us off the freeway. A slowdown? A blockage? Was it really bad enough to route us onto back roads? We’d never make it. 

Our success with google maps has been iffy at best this trip. Sometimes it routes us off the main roads into residential areas, presumably to save a few seconds. There had been no way to tell the app: we are towing a boat! Leave us on the main roads even if it takes 30 seconds longer!

The exit was coming up fast – just seconds ahead – we’d need to decide immediately. It was a long detour in an extremely rural area – once we made our decision there’d be no going back. We quickly debated. Do we go around the freeway blockage on country highways, or wait it out on the freeway? If we took the country highways, we would definitely arrive after 3:00. There’s no way we’d make it. In the last second we decided to ignore the reroute directions from the navigation app, and stay on the freeway and hope for the best. Sometimes freeway back-ups can clear quickly.

We sped on, hope diminishing. I could see the purple line on my phone map showing the freeway blockage up ahead. There was no other available route around the blockage. I remembered the two-hour delay we experienced a couple months ago on our way down to Tucson from Phoenix. The freeway had been completely closed the entire morning. Will it be that bad?

Suddenly I realized the backup was due to a border control check-point. That was excellent news. Border control back-ups come and go much more readily than major freeway accidents. Maybe we would make it after all!

Sure enough, we breezed through border control. They waved cheerfully and didn’t even want to peek into our heavily loaded van (white privilege, btw). Fingers crossed, we were going to make it.

We made it to Walgreens at 2:50, with a full ten minutes to spare. They were waiting for me. Although I’m not good at sweet-talking, I am very good at profuse thank-you’s. I was so grateful! Thank you, thank you, thank you!

I was the local celebrity, the one who drove all the way from Las Cruces to get my shot.

This concludes the series about our trip to Florida and back. I hope you enjoyed the story! We enjoyed our challenging and unique vacation. Soon we will all be able to go back to having normal vacations again.

To send Kristina a comment, email turning51bykristina@gmail.com