I like to gas up at 5:00 on a Friday, because it gives me a few minutes to pause and think. Because, by 5:03, I’ll be back on the road, trying not to get roped into a drag race with some guy in a V8.
I’m firing on six cylinders, so there’s always some show-off who wants to race. I’ve raced some people, sure, but I’m usually too emotionally exhausted to put much effort into impressing a guy in a big truck.
I stopped at one of our local Shell stations this evening. I was enjoying my little break before the long journey home. As I was gassing up, I noticed a guy with a big trailer was trying to pull into the gas station.
Now, my dad has a son, too, but he made sure that his youngest daughter also learned how to tie up/wrap my chains whenever someone needs to hook up a trailer. You have to tie the chains a little, you see, so that they’re suspended. So that they won’t drag on the road.
The chains on this trailer weren’t just dragging across the ground. They were making music, baby! So much janglin’ that I thought I was at an Edward Sharpe and The Magnetic Zeros concert. It was wild.
I looked away, because it was almost time for me to hang up the nozzle. And that was when I noticed a cobweb on the sign over the pump. I was torn: the side of me that likes cleanliness wanted to sweep it off. But the side of me that likes spiders — I really do! — didn’t want to disturb their web-weaving.
I ended up leaving the web alone. I’m not going to evict any spiders, because I’m not a landlord. Thank goodness.
Jamais Mayville 