Jonathan
Lindeboom
Composition
1
Mr.
Dilbeck
9/20/13
Jeep
Troubles
From the time of getting my permit
to the time of getting my license, felt like the longest six months of my life.
I’ve worked on cars since I was about 10, and still do, to this day. Modifying
jeeps to make them more off-road capable was my favorite thing to do. My first
car ended up being a 96 Jeep Cherokee that was lifted three and a half inches
with big tires for mud-running and lots of other little accessories to get
myself through any obstacle. My dad had owned the jeep for 14 years before me
and has took it all over the country pushing it to the limits. He would always
tell me, “ you know, you would be surprised what this rig can go through!”
“Yahh uhh huh whatever,” would be my
usual response not knowing what it is truly capable of.
Like any other teenager that gets
his or her license on their birthday, I wanted to go cruise the town with my
friends. In my case it was more like “lets go to the slate pits.” The slate
pits is an abandoned piece of property about 15 min outside of town where
everyone who has an off-road rig takes it to have some fun.
I picked up two of my best friends
named Jordan and Griffin. I’ve been friends with the two of them since 2nd
grade, and we always end up causing some mischief, but always having fun at the
same time.
We arrived at the slate pits at
about two o’clock, with full intentions of staying til dark and burning through
my 70-dollar full tank of gas. I was a little skeptical of what the jeep was capable
of at first, but my friends in the back screaming things in the back like; “you
cant go up that ridge!” So naturally I would have to prove them wrong, and go
climb the ridge. Hour by hour by friends were getting more and more impressed ,
but I think I was the most impressed out of the three of us. The immense hills
and mud pits that it was crawling through with little to no wheel spin was
enough to impress anyone.
“Holy shit, look at that!” exclaimed
Griffin.
“Where, What?”
questioned Jordan.
Then
we all feasted our eyes on the biggest mud hole of the day. At this point we
were getting close to the exit of the slate pits, but we were still close to
the river, therefore everything that we were going through was very moist and
muddy. The hole we were all amazed at was about 20 feet long and had sitting
water on top of it. This is usually not a good sign.
“You got it,” said Griffin while
laughing a little bit.
We
all looked at each other and smiled. We then proceeded to take off our
seatbelts, incase water started to come inside the jeep. To be honest, I had a
gut feeling that we wouldn’t make it; but the curious side of me couldn’t
resist but to try it.
We entered the hole slowly but
gaining momentum at the same time. The key to getting through mud is to keep
forward momentum and keep your front wheels straight. But unfortunately there
was a slight bend in the pit.
“GO GO GO!” they kept screaming as
we were roaring through the pit. Next thing we knew we were sitting, not
moving, with all four tires spinning. I opened up the door to find mud all the
way up to the bottom of my door.
“We’re screwed,” I said. The three of us looked at each other and
started busting out laughing. I knew my dad was going to be mad if I called him
to say that I was stuck, and I explained this to my friends so we all agreed to
just start digging.
