Department of English

Spring 2005 High School Edition

All in a Sunday Afternoon

Myrianne Heaton
Essay (9th-10th)
Second Place
Hurricane High School
Teacher: Sharon May

It was at about 2 p.m. on Sunday, October 3, 2004, when the phone rang. I answered it. It was my brother, Craig. He asked for Mom or Dad. I then said, “Which one do you want, Mom or Dad?” Craig said that he wanted Dad. A few moments later, I knew why it was Dad that he wanted.

Though we, my mom, my eldest brother Christopher, and my older sister Dolores, and me, couldn’t hear Craig’s side of the conversation, hearing Dad’s side was enough. There was a long pause on my dad’s side when he first got the phone. Then my dad said, “You’re stuck?” Then we heard, “Where?” A few moments later, when Dad got off of the phone, we found out where. Craig was stuck in the four-wheeler tracks on the way to Virgin.

The five of us at home all went up to help even though Craig said that we wouldn’t be able to. We were ignorant of how bad Craig was stuck. All of us at home thought that my dad’s truck or Christopher’s Nissan Pathfinder would be able to get Craig out. It was about a ten minute drive to get to Craig, but as soon as we saw Craig’s truck, we knew that we were going to need bigger trucks if we were going to salvage it.

Craig had been razor-backing on a skinny four-wheeler trail when his truck had slid almost all of the way off the edge of a cliff. On both sides of him, there were cliffs, so you can imagine how difficult it was going to be to get him out.

Craig had been driving down the trail and didn’t see exactly where the road was, so he was slightly off. This caused his truck to slip most of the way down the side of the cliff. He then tried a few times to get back on the trail, but this only made him slip farther and farther down. From the looks of it when I got there, absolutely nothing was holding the truck up but a little mound of sand. I was shocked and thankful that my brother was still alive because just a slight push or turn of the wheel could have sent Craig’s truck toppling over with him inside.

There was another family, the Gearmans, on the same trail who thought they could do something to help Craig. When they saw how bad Craig’s truck was stuck, they didn’t think that it was going to survive, so they didn’t try anything until we got there.

My father and brothers soon realized that we would have to anchor Craig’s truck with two other trucks, and then try to dig and push him out. As the Gearmans’ truck wasn’t a four wheel drive and neither was my dad’s, and Christopher’s Pathfinder’s drive line was too low, none of them could clear all the hills and inclines on the way to the vertical rise of the cliff. This made it so no one could get close enough to hitch onto the chains and ropes we had connected to Craig’s truck.

My dad had already called to have the wrecker come. We still needed another truck, so Christopher called a family friend, Mark Hicken, who has a full size, four wheel drive Ford truck. First, they latched the back end of Craig’s truck to Mark’s truck with the rope and chains. When that was in place, the guys started digging, so there would be a good trail for Craig to drive his truck on when the Wrecker got there.

When the wrecker finally came, it got stuck and unstuck a few times when it tried to get into position. There was no way that this was going to work, so Mark switched places with Jason, the driver of the Wrecker. When Mark drove forward to loosen the chains so they could be unlatched, Craig’s truck slipped down the cliff even further. In reality, they probably switched the trucks very fast, but it didn’t seem like it was fast enough. I thought for sure Craig’s truck was going to roll because, to me, it seemed as though it was slipping.

As soon as all the chains were hooked up again, Craig got halfway in his truck so he could steer it, but still jump out if something should go wrong.

The chains were used to stabilize and to pull the truck until it was horizontal so Craig could drive up the side of the cliff to the trail. This was not an easy task though, because with the angle of Craig’s truck, Mr. Gearman had to sit on the driver side of the hood to keep the truck steady. When Craig’s truck was finally straight, the rear passenger wheel did not touch the ground. Dust flew, and things were very chaotic, but his truck did get back on the trail.

Once Craig was back on level ground, my heart could try to settle again, or at least that’s what I thought. Since Craig had been tearing up and down these razorbacks for about an hour, he had slipped more than once and, as a result, destroyed the only ways of getting down, that is, except a very steep decline. I, personally, did not think that he should try to get down that way because it was way too risky, but it was the only possible way. Michael Gearman didn’t seem to think that Craig should go down this way either because he refused to watch and said that he liked to see trucks roll, but not with people inside.

Craig did make it down that decline, though I have yet to figure out how he did because his truck was going so fast it seemed as if it would go bed over hood down that steep slope. As soon as all the chains and tools were loaded back in the trucks, we were on our way home. Craig did get a good yelling from Mom and Dad, but mostly we were just glad that Craig, and his truck, were still alive.