Being 19, and having little knowledge of the mechanics of a car, I was leaving my girlfriend’s house when the check engine on my dash lit up and illuminated a bright orangey color. If you have ever seen this spectrum of illumination in your car, and wonder, “What’s wrong? What made the light come on?” Then you know how I felt.
Not possessing the ability to deduct any reasonability for the glow before me, I did just what the light asked me to do. I switched the car off, popped the hood. Then I got out of the car and raised the hood. I looked at the engine. “Well it’s still there. Why did it want to me to check it?” I said this out loud addressing my car, “What do you want me to do now? I’ve checked the engine, it’s still there.” The car didn’t respond. I lowered the hood, and resumed my position behind the steering wheel. I turned the key, and the ignition switch went “Click”. I said, “Come on now, tell the engine to start. I’ve checked it, I know it’s there.” I turned the key again, and still was answered with, “Click”.
I knew I had to get it towed, but thought I might put be able to put it off until tomorrow if I could talk my girlfriend’s parents into letting me stay over. They allowed me to sleep on the couch, and the next day I had it towed to a repair shop. I don’t remember what was the diagnosis, or even how much the bill was, but I believe it was a sensor that was clogged or something to that effect.
Talking to some friends of mine the next week who advised me, “It would probably have been all right to drive the car home as long as you didn’t hear anything wrong with the engine and none of the other warning lights came on in your dashboard.”
A few years passed and I still had the same car. No girlfriend at the time, but the same car. This time a friend was with me, and we had been club hopping in Atlanta and somehow wound up on Memorial Drive in Stone Mountain at another club.
We left the club and started heading to where I lived in Snellville when that blasted Check Engine light came on and started broadcasting its message in the familiar orange glow.
“John Paul,” my friend said. “Your check engine light is on.”
“Don’t worry about it”, I replied back quickly. “I hear the engine running, I know it’s there.”
The End
J.P. Nix 