The Good, the Bad, The Ugly

The title could easily summarize Kanyon's first year of competitive wrestling in high school. But...this is NOT a wrestling post (that will come later). However, this post is about one weekend in December that DID begin with a wrestling tournament. It started out good, unfortunately turned bad, and then it just got downright ugly. 

Kanyon's first 2-day tournament of the wrestling season was in American Falls on Friday, Dec, 2 and Saturday the 3rd. Josh and I drove down on Friday to watch. We took the truck and cargo trailer, which was filled with the belongings of Hannah Vermaas, my bestie Amanda's mom. Amanda and her husband Ryan had just been in Salmon for the week, packing up the remnants of her mom's house and cleaning it in anticipation of listing the home for sale. On Thursday night, we finished loading up the trailer with everything that didn't fit in the U-Haul truck (with the assistance of other friends), in order to deliver its belongings to North Ogden, where Amanda and Ryan live, and where Hannah's new apartment was located. The plan was to take the trailer to Utah on Saturday after Kanyon's wrestling tournament was over. Josh and I spent the night in Pocatello at a little Air BnB place, and then drove the truck and trailer back to American Falls on Saturday to watch the rest of Kanyon's tournament before heading to Utah. 

Amanda and Ryan had also left Salmon on Friday, but they'd spent the night in Idaho Falls after attending a benefit dinner there with our friend John. On Saturday morning, as they were on their way back home to Utah, they stopped in American Falls to watch Kanyon wrestle. They watched him compete in 3 matches, and Kanyon won his 3rd match, which was so exciting for all of us to see! I was so glad he had spectators to witness his first win of the season! We really appreciated their support and I know Kanyon loved having them there as well. Amanda and Ryan are like an aunt and uncle to him and he really values his relationship with them.   

That was the GOOD segment of this post.

Josh and I left American Falls around 4:30 that afternoon after Kanyon's last match of the day. Several miles after passing Malad, Josh looked in the mirrors as someone was passing us and he saw smoke; it looked like it was coming from under our trailer. He pulled off at the next exit, got out, and could see the trailer truly was smoking by the rear driver's side tire. Thankfully that exit had a gas station, so he drove up to it and pulled into the parking lot there since there was light and resources (it was already dark out and there were no other store options for miles, plus it was a Saturday evening, so most regular businesses were already closed by that point). At first, he'd thought it was the trailer brakes smoking, but upon further inspection, it appeared the bearing was bad. 

Josh knew he needed to pull the tire off in order to see the problem. He searched in the truck for the jack, but discovered the jack had been taken out of the pickup at some previous time and never got put back. He knew there was a jack inside of the packed trailer, but he had to climb through a bunch of stuff to get it--which he did, but it was dark and cold, and that made it even more difficult. He jacked up the trailer, and got the tire off, using gloves because it was too hot to touch. 

See the smoke coming from the hub?

That was the BAD news portion of the post. This is where it started to get ugly. 

After the tire was off, he saw the bearing was gone, and it had completely destroyed the hub. Josh knew that if we kept driving with the trailer in this condition, the tire could blow apart into the other tire, and then we'd really be in trouble. In order to keep driving, it would be better to do so without the hub flopping around, so he needed to get the axel nut off (which was already partially destroyed from the hub rubbing on it). He got the cotter pin out of the axel nut, and the next step was to pry the ruined axel nut off of the axel. 

Unfortunately, he didn't have any tools in the truck bigger than a pair of pliers for the job. He went into the gas station to see if they had a crescent wrench, but they didn't. He started searching in the trailer and found Amanda's dad's toolbox, but all it had was a small pair of vice grips. So he used the vice grips to pull on the axel nut, and alternated chipping at it with a hammer and chisel too, trying to break the nut free. He was in the process of doing that, while leaning over and using his forehead to brace himself against the trailer, when he slipped and gashed his eyelid. By this point, the nut was getting loose, so with blood running down his face, he kept working the nut loose with the vice grips until he was able to get it all the way off, and then he pulled the whole hub assembly off. I was a wreck watching this whole process, feeling so helpless. I was texting people, messaging people I knew who lived nearby, and praying fervently. I am so useless when it comes to vehicles, vehicle problems, and situations in which I have zero control. I started having a major panic attack after Josh got hurt--which didn't help matters when he was already tired, frustrated, and bleeding!  

With the rear driver's side wheel and assembly gone on the double-axel trailer, it was drive-able again. Thankfully it wasn't loaded too heavily. We drove the last 60 miles to Ogden, going 50mph, hoping none of the other tires would give out. It was a stressful drive: I couldn't stop crying, so even though Josh's eye kept bleeding, he was in better shape to drive than I was. He just kept looking in the rearview mirrors, driving cautiously, and trying to quiet me since I just kept blubbering about the terrible events and vocally praying that we'd make it safely. Which thankfully we did! 

We stayed at a crappy hotel right by the freeway in Ogden, and Amanda arrived shortly after with food she'd picked up for us. We ate, recounted the events of the evening, and tried to relax after all the stress we'd both encountered. 

I'd been wanting to see the limited-release movie "Spirited" in the theater for weeks, but it wasn't available in eastern Idaho, so she convinced me to go out with her and see it that night (much to my hesitation in the moment), giving Josh a break from my emotional state of being. I cried some more as she and I drove there and sat in the theater, processing what I'd feared about the whole turn of events. I felt so much better being with her, and I was able to enjoy the movie, which was based on Charles Dickens's "Christmas Carol". I was glad she'd convinced me to go. When she dropped me back off at the hotel late that night, Josh was sound asleep. 

The next morning, Josh's eye looked worse--he'd developed bruising in addition to the fresh scar on his eyelid! He had the black eye for several days afterward, and had quite a tale to recount when asked about it. I am SO grateful it wasn't worse than it was, though. Thankfully it healed just fine. 

We checked out of the hotel and drove the trailer to Amanda's house and parked it in her driveway. The original plan was to unload it that day into Amanda's garage and drive the empty trailer back to Salmon, but that wasn't going to happen anymore! Instead, we left the loaded trailer there so it could be unloaded at their leisure (since Hannah wasn't moving into her apartment until one week later, it actually worked out better for them anyway) and we drove back to Salmon without it. 

On Monday morning, Josh called trailer companies around Ogden and made an appointment with a local trailer shop there to have it worked on after Amanda's family could unload it when Hannah moved into her apartment one week later. We met up with Amanda to pick up the trailer after Christmas, so I guess the story has a good ending. However, I feel like it's important to note that we've now used this trailer twice to help move people across state lines, and in both instances, we encountered tire problems. This time the problems escalated, so I don't think we'll be volunteering a 3rd time anytime soon to help people move to/from Idaho!