The Day I Almost Hitch-Hiked

     Before I begin my hitch-hiking story, I’ll just say that everyone who gave me feedback on whether to use blond or blonde, thought I should leave it how it is. Therefore, you will not notice any spelling changes in the pre-existing posts, title, etc. J

     We have friends that live about six to eight miles away and I sometimes ride my bike over there to go swimming in their pond. It’s great exercise. A few days ago, I decided to bike there, meet my mom who was already there visiting, and go swimming with her.

     It was all fine until I got to the train tracks. A train was slowing down and didn’t look like it would clear the crossing before it stopped completely. I started to walk my bike down the way to go behind the train, when it finally stopped. Hurrying back, I made the decision to climb over the hitch of two of the cars.

     The hitch was higher than my waist, so it wasn’t easy trying to lift my bike over. The train started to creak and groan and being a little apprehensive that it might start up again, I threw my bike over and climbed over myself. On the other side was a truck with a trailer full of hay bails behind it. The person driving probably thought he was seeing things when a bike, then a girl flew over the hitch of the two cars. Anyway, I picked up my bike and realized that something was terribly wrong.

     Instead of being horizontal, the handlebars were diagonal. Undaunted, I hopped on and tried to steer using that cockeyed position. That would have been ok, but I quickly found out that my pedaling did no good since the chain was off. I nearly fell, but managed to steer clear of the truck with the hay bales, and as I went past, the old farmer inside waved amiably to me as if seeing someone throw their bike over a train hitch and then try to steer their mangled bike was an everyday occurrence. I decided not to ask him for help.

     I ended up walking my bike down the country road, trying to decide what to do. It was nearly 100 degrees in the sun as we have been going through a hot spell, and my mind jumped to all sorts of conclusions about horrible sunburns and heat stroke as I was probably a good two or three miles away from my destination. I had no cell phone or water and my flip flops kept sticking to the hot tar on the road which was really annoying.

     After awhile, I decided that I should get a start on my bucket list by hitch-hiking. I started to practice using my best hopeful, helpless expression while sticking out my thumb. A few cars went by, but I just couldn’t do it. I mean, what if the person who picked me up was just waiting for someone to murder? You have to think about these things.

     “I’ll make sure it’s a girl,” I told myself. Usually, girls don’t murder people.

     Sometimes it was hard to tell what the person looked like until they were just passing me and by then, it was too late.

     “I’ll make sure it’s a girl in a truck or SUV,” I further clarified to make sure my bike would be picked up, too. Beside, girls in trucks or SUVs are less likely to murder someone than girls in cars. I’m sure that’s statistic somewhere.

     I just didn’t have enough guts to do it, so I walked almost the whole way, until my mom came looking for me in the car, taking away my last chance to truly hitch-hike. I can’t say I really minded.