As I start my 2001 Volkswagen Passat for the first time in 2 months, it clicks for a few seconds before rolling over. The back left speaker doesn’t work anymore and the button for the trunk doesn’t work anymore so I just have to use the key. All these malfunctions remind me of August 27th, the day my car flooded. My good friend, Ben Lund, and I just got done eating Subway and decided to go to Sioux Falls so we could get school supplies. On our way up there I get a call from my girlfriend, Jenna Horrocks, saying that she no longer has band practice.
It was cut short because of a thunder storm that was coming. We decided to go pick her up just so we could hangout. As we were on our way to go pick her up, it began to rain. Hard. As we were turning off to get on the interstate, a guy in a yellow cobalt cuts us off almost causing us to rear-end him, Ben and I retaliate by cussing him out. “How someone can drive so stupidly in such bad weather? ” I ask Ben. “Some people I guess. ” Mutters Ben. Ben and I pull into the Howard Wood Field parking lot and wait for Jenna. I see her running through the rain after a little while.
She runs over to her car and grabs a sweatshirt before getting in my car. We drove to the mall first. I had to pick up a t-shirt that I ordered online and Ben wanted to buy one. We looked around Hot Topic for a bit before leaving the mall. We manage to drive through the rain and get to Walmart. The Walmart parking lot was packed more than a mosh pit at Warped Tour. “I’m starting to have second thoughts about trying to drive through this” I say to myself, but I push the thoughts to the back of my head and park my car. We run through the rain and get inside.
Quickly, we find the supplies we need, notebooks, sharpies, etc. We get to the exit and see how bad it’s raining outside. I decide to just run ut and bring the car up to the exit while they wait inside. They get in and we are starting to get worried. “Let’s go to Barnes and Noble to wait for the storm to calm down,” suggests Jenna. At this point I can barely see. I’ve never seen it rain this hard in my life, except when we went to Arizona during monsoon season. We find a place to park. Surprise surprise, there aren’t many people at Barnes and Noble during a terrifying thunder storm.
We run inside trying not to get drenched. Trying to ignore the cracks of thunder and pounding of rain on the roof, we casually talk about book series we like and have read. After a hile of our way-too-casual conversation, we start trying to figure out what we’re going to do. Jenna calls her father to explain what’s going on. He says something along the lines of be safe and do what you need to in order to get home safe. I somehow decide that it would be a good idea to try to get through the storm, get Jenna home, and drive Ben and myself home.
I get outside and just kind of stand there. I stare out at the street and the traffic and just have this moment of “I think we may be screwed. ” I quickly run to my car, almost get hit by a lifted truck, get in and start it up. I look up from the dash and tare, awestruck, out the windshield. It’s raining so hard that it looks that I’m in a car wash. I can barely see out the windshield. I back out of my spot and pull up to the front doors of the book store. Jenna and Ben basically dive into the car. We’re all soaking wet and trying to comprehend what’s going on around us.
At this point I have two options: stay in the parking lot and wait for the storm to pass, or try and drive through the storm. Wel.. not thinking right, I chose to drive through it. Worst mistake I made that night. Worst mistake I made all year probably. I start to drive towards the exit of the parking lot. As I do this, I see that there is some water on the road. It honestly didn’t look like there was that much water, so I pulled out of the drive way. As soon as I hit the street I knew that I had messed up. My car started to slow down and I could tell it was going to die soon.
I go maybe another 5 yards and it dies. Ben and I start freaking out as water starts entering the car. Trucks that are driving by us are creating waves that start thrashing the car, shoving it to the curb. As the cold water reach my shin, it felt as if it was slapping me. The cold water sent chills up my leg like I had just jumped into a lake. Ben and I decide that we need to start grabbing our stuff and get out of the car. All this time I’m oblivious to Jenna having a panic attack in the back seat, as the water is starting to rise above the seat. I basically jump over the seat to try and comfort her.
I’m trying everything I can think of but nothing is working. After probably 3 minutes of me trying to calm her down she finally calms down, looks up at me with tears in her eyes and a smile on her face, and says “It’s just another adventure. ” I give her a tight hug and tell her to start grabbing her stuff. I tell them as soon as they get out to climb the curb nd go to the entrance of Men’s Warehouse, which my car was sitting outside of at this point. Ben and I get out of the front doors and Jenna climbs over the seat and goes out the passenger’s side. We get to the entrance and put our stuff down.
Ben and I go back down to the car to make sure we didn’t forget anything when we see a group of about 8 guys walking through the water helping people move their cars. We get their attention and they help us push my car up onto the curb. After thanking them we head back up to Men’s Warehouse. After a while of talking to a few of the guys that work there, Ben and I decide we hould get the car up into the parking lot. Some guys come help us pick up the back and get it into the parking lot. Ben and I are then able to push it into a spot away from the water and park it.
We grab a few more things from the car before returning to Jenna. For the next hour we just stood there and talked to the other frightened people that were stuck there while watching the flood and waiting for Richard, Ben’s dad, to come pick us up. I honestly wasn’t worried, or even sad. I was actually enjoying myself. Ben, Jenna, and I made it out safe. What else could I ask for? (Probably that my car didn’t get flooded, but oh well) After little longer of waiting, Ben gets a call from his dad saying that he is here to get us, but we would have to make our way to the Wendy’s parking lot.
We grabbed all of our stuff and started trudging our way over there. At one point we had to go through a ditch where the water was up to my waist. We get to the parking lot where we see Ben’s dad’s truck. We hop in and start to drive over to Jenna’s house so we could drop her off. The traffic was awful. We ended up having to go through the Hy-Vee parking lot just to get around it all. We saw a jeep that tried to go over a patch of grass to get to the road, well, the “patch of rass” was actually a 10 foot deep puddle of water.
The jeep was almost fully submerged. We stopped at a gas station before we get to Jenna’s house to get some food and water. I got Jenna and myself some coffee. We drop her off before heading home. I got home, thanked Ben and Richard for everything, went inside. I talked to my parents for a little while before going to bed. I woke up sick, probably from standing out in the rain all night. Now, my car runs fine again, although it’s a little louder than it used to be and has a few electrical issues. That night was just another adventure, the first of many to come.