I chose to stay for that length of time to learn more of what I didn’t know about living in and from my car. And I learned. The hard way mostly.

For two consecutive days, I didn’t leave the spot, and worked in and around the car with most of the doors open throughout the day. This was for ventilation and also because I figured out effective ways to create sun-shields, allowing me to sit in shade in sweltering temperatures, out of the blazing sun.

As it was, I still got badly sunburned just from being in and out of the glare. The second evening of this 2-day period, a very powerful thunderstorm blew up and started to unleash relatively heavy rain immediately. The sky became very dark; winds were strong enough to rock the car, rain pelted down from what seemed like every direction. Fortunately, I had paid attention to the

clouds gathering in the distance and had quickly drawn everything except my camp chair and step ladder into the car. Those I tied to a nearby tree so they might be there after the storm.

Then, as the first rain started to fall, I settled in for a long night, starting very early (6pm). The storm quickly became a cracker! Lightning, thunder, rain, wind in epic proportions lasting for quite a while.

Other than realizing the truth of the fact that, even though cars have rubber tires, they are essentially metal boxes, and with little else in the vicinity to draw the energy of the lightning bolts, I made peace with the possibility that I might exit this planet similarly to how I arrived – in the midst of an epic thunderstorm. And so, I relaxed into the stormy experience.

I started to get sleepy a few hours later and reached for my car key fob to lock the doors, discovering that the car wasn’t responding to the key. Quickly, I realized that the car battery was drained of charge and that, somehow, all of the doors of the car were already locked. As was I – LOCKED in the car – with no immediate way to exit.

The storm continued to pelt the area were I was parked for the next couple of hours. It then passed a fair distance to the NorthEast, creating a most extraordinary natural ‘light show’ for quite a long time. Dark skies encompassed very frequent lightning regularly firing in quick succession within a massive thundercloud. It was SO beautiful and powerful and easy to see why the storm, when overhead, seemed so strong. Because it WAS!

WOW.

I fell asleep thinking of various strategies for what to do upon awakening ‘in the morning’, knowing I would have to figure out how to get out of the car. I had seen a majority of other campers (mostly boats and RVs) leaving quickly at around 5:30-6 pm when the storm first arrived. With very few people left in the rather large area, I didn’t think anyone would notice that I was in a predicament. Sure, I could start to move things from the front seat into the back of the car, where I slept, and then launch myself over the seats to honk the horn. One strategy for consideration.

A few hours later, the storm returned from the NE and was hotter and harder than it had been originally. Thank Goodness I don’t believe I have ‘dues to pay’, ’karma to clear’ or ‘debts to settle’ with the gods, or I would’ve been unnerved by this return performance, especially so enhanced. (heheheh)

As it was, this was another exciting moment being within and part of the ecosystem of that amazing storm – feeling its potential to clear and clean landscapes which often wreaks havoc with humans and our routines and ‘things’.

I didn’t sleep well – the storm had something to do with that, and more than that, my concern was more about how to exit a locked car with the locks controlled by electronics that, clearly, were ‘off – line’. As I tossed and turned and woke up regularly throughout the night, I soothed

myself back to sleep by singing the refrain of a song I love. ‘Calling All Angels’. As I sang it, I imagined my angels coming to my rescue by morning.

(Here are two different versions of the song .. Train singing this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TaG9SDxwPBg. Jane Siberry and KD Lang, this

version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KRUErh47sao .)

Around 5:30 am the next morning, I awoke. As I sat up and contemplated the fact that rain was STILL falling, though very lightly, the last door that I had closed the night before activated and opened.

Whaaaaaat?

I was not touching, or even very near, the key or fob. I was startled and amazed. And more than a little grateful. Also concerned that, if I exited the car and the door ‘shut itself’, I would be completely without shelter for who knows how long and in what kind of weather.

So the questions I faced were: Do I get OUT of the car or stay put? What if the door closes itself? If the door DOES stay open, how do I best shield the interior of the car from the rain still falling?

Since I didn’t know HOW the door had suddenly opened (other than ‘All Angels’ had responded to the ‘Call’), or if it would stay open or suddenly shut, I decided to dress, grabbed my toothbrush, key fob and handbag with essentials (money, number for calling road service assistance – Triple A – who I could call.) Oh yes, and my phone, and to take my chances with this new- found, precious freedom from the confines of my car.

Wonderfully, the rain eased off suddenly. (Thank you, Angels, once again.)

And I began to relax.

A medium-sized RV had come IN to the area at some point during the storm and parked opposite my space, As I further relaxed, a very friendly woman came around their vehicle and said, ‘Good Morning! How are you?’

I responded with ‘Good Morning! I am fine, thank you. And you?’ (‘Fine’, she said.) I said, ‘That was some storm last night, eh?’ She agreed. Then I said, ‘Discovered as the storm started last night that my car battery is dead.’

Next, I was about to say that I’d be calling Triple A for help, when she said, ‘Oh, my nephew can jump-start that for you. He’ll be back in a few minutes!’ As if on cue, up drove Nephew who took his Auntie’s instruction to pull over to my space and start my car battery.

I had already transferred everything out of the front seats to the back where they are stored when I am driving, and not sleeping, so the lever for the hood (under which the dormant car battery lay) was accessible to me.

Eric, (aka Nephew) good-naturedly jump-started the battery and we thenchatted for a couple minutes about where they had been and where they were headed.

Another young man walking a very old dog came into view and asked with obvious interest, ‘What’s going on here?’ I explained and he said, ‘I’ll be right back’. And disappeared as quickly as he, and ‘dog’, had appeared.

Eric moved his Jeep, I let my car run a little bit, loathe to turn it off before I could charge up the battery more. And again, here comes ‘young man’ and ‘dog’.

THIS young man, I’ll call him Kip, (which is his real name and I’m using it because he thought that’d be the thing to do when I told him I’d be mentioning this to my friends) had a battery in-hand when he returned.

He explained that it would top up my car’s newly-jumpstarted battery. He set it up and said he’d be back in a couple of hours to get it, after taking ‘dog’ -whose real name is Buddy, for a walk.