Wes Anderson’s leaning forlornly at the edge of a deserted gravel road, but instead of doing anything about it, Josh is getting his drone ready to fly. I’m fixing my hair and refreshing my makeup. Dark clouds are building and one of our sponsors gave me some waterproof mascara. This might be a good time for a Josh & Siobhan Sponsor Showcase.
Josh calls out over his shoulder: “Maybe get those new Arc’teryx jackets. Looks like a chance to give them a plug.”
Great minds, right?
On the one hand, this is the challenge of travel vlogging. It’s bad enough that you’re stuck with a flat tire in the emptiest part of Saskatchewan when you’d expected to be soaking in the vibes on a butte in Grasslands National Park. But before you can fix the tire, you have to record it all for the vlog.
Hence the drone, which admittedly does add a certain high-production-value gloss to our content. That shot of poor, disabled Wes Anderson surrounded by a sea of grass will look great.
Mind you, if Josh hadn’t bought the drone we could have picked up a set of new tires. Or maybe bought a better van than a 20-year-old Westfalia, which Josh named for his favourite director.
As I’m digging out the new rain jackets, Josh climbs inside. He’s got the drone airborne, and he’s getting some establishing shots of the stranded van and the lonesome prairie as the drone circles like a vulture.
“Do you think maybe you’ve got enough? You can start changing the flat?”
He’s focused on landing the drone. “Be better if you changed it.”
“What?”
He turns to me. “It’d be more on-brand for you. Female empowerment.”
Sure, I talk about empowerment on our vlog, but usually, when I’m doing yoga at some carefully selected scenic viewpoint.
I consider refusing, but I realize that I’m not certain that Josh knows how to change a flat. I put my hair in a ponytail and step outside while Josh digs out the jack and tools. He places them by the flat and peers underneath the back bumper.
I don’t like the puzzled look on his face. “You don’t know where the spare is?”
“I’ll look it up.” He pulls out his phone to reveal what I already knew – there’s no service here. “I’m sure they said it was under the van.”
He checks under the front and calls out in triumph. “Bingo! Over here.”
I get there and he hands me a wrench.
“You just loosen a couple of bolts and the spare drops down. I’ll get the camera.”
I’m not going to lie on my back on gravel just so he can capture all the excitement for our followers. I tell him I’ll change the tire, but crawling underneath the van is his job. He replies that we want to show a strong, resourceful woman who can do things for herself. It would be dishonest for him to do part of the job. And he refuses to be a dishonest filmmaker.
I point out that he’s a vlogger, not a filmmaker. Then I remind him of the times we arrived at a destination too late for sunset, so we just shot at dawn and pretended the sun was going down. So don’t give me that “honesty in filmmaking” crap.
Once again, we’re beset by artistic differences.
With a mighty sigh, he hands me the camera. He rolls onto his back and I hear grunts and heavy breathing and the sound of metal on metal and Josh cursing Wes Anderson and the German factory workers who built him and the engineers who designed the spare tire assembly. But eventually, he eases out from underneath, and I see that he’s managed to free the spare.
He holds his hands out to show me a thin trickle of blood, and I realize I’m expected to play nurse. I get out the first aid kit and take an alcohol wipe to the cut. It’s more of a scrape, really, along his knuckles.
“Is my tetanus shot up to date?”
I hope this is a rhetorical question. We’re not at the keeping-track-of-one-another’s-vaccinations stage of this relationship.
After I wrap a bandage around his hand, Josh tentatively practises opening and closing his fingers and I notice that we’ve got company. A pickup with a truck camper is approaching, and in the cloud of dust it throws up, I can see at least one other vehicle. As they pull over about ten metres from Wes Anderson, I notice Quebec licence plates.
“This is great,” I tell Josh. “Maybe they can help.”
“What about empowerment?”
“Sometimes, Josh, expressing your vulnerability is the greatest form of empowerment.” I think that’s from Brené Brown; Josh said I should quote her on the vlog to boost engagement.
I wave as the first driver steps out of his truck.
“Is everything okay?” he asks.
“We had a blowout,” I say. “I think we hit a pothole too fast.”
In a chorus of door openings and closings, the first driver is joined by two others. They all approach the right rear tire, and the first driver squats to get a closer look.
“She’s dead, this one,” he says, working a finger into the rip in the rubber. The others agree that it’s beyond patching. “You have a spare tire?”
“We were just going to put it on,” Josh says, launching into a long explanation about capturing all the experiences of travel, the good and the bad, on our vlog.
“Vuh-log?” one of the men says.
Josh starts to explain, but they’re not listening. One of the three brings the spare over, while another places the jack in front of the flat tire and begins to turn the handle.
“Get in there, Siobhan,” Josh says, placing the camera to his eye.
As the other two get started, the first driver introduces himself and his group. They’re brothers travelling with their wives on a cross-Canada trip to see the mountains and the Pacific. I look back at their vehicles and see three women setting up lawn chairs. They smile and wave, and I wave back.
“I said last Christmas, Helene and me, we go west this summer and Marc says he want to go too. And then Gaetan says ‘me too!’”
Gaetan, the brother with the jack, turns his head at this and smiles. “I work on the oil rigs a long time ago. I tell André and Marc I want to see the mountains again. So we do a big family trip.”
Gaetan gestures for me to watch what he’s doing. “See where I put the jack? So it’s lifting the van by the frame, eh? Remember that. Now, you turn the handle; feel how the jack helps you lift.”
I give it a few turns. It’s surprisingly satisfying.
“Okay. Now before we get the tire off the ground, we loosen the bolts. Here, you try. It might be hard.”
I place the tire iron on one of the bolts and turn. Nothing happens. I put more weight into it. Still nothing.
“She’s tight,” André observes from above us.
Gaetan takes a turn. I see his muscles flex and the cords of his neck stand out with the effort. He puts the iron down and heads off toward the convoy of Quebecois vehicles. Marc picks up the iron. “Maybe he loosen it for me,” he says, with a wink. It doesn’t budge for Marc either.
André turns his attention to Josh. “When is the last time you change the tires?”
“These tires were already on when I got it in the spring.”
“You want maybe a whole new set.” He puts a hand on Josh’s shoulder and leads him on an inspection tour of the other three.
Gaetan comes back with a bottle, which he explains contains penetrating oil. He sprays it on all the nuts. “Now we wait.” He rises and wipes the dust from his pants. “Come, I introduce you to my wife.”
Gaetan, Marc and I walk back to the convoy. I notice that the women have set up a table with cheese and crackers and one of them is pouring wine. As Gaetan and Marc are introducing their wives – Jocelyn and Nathalie – a plastic goblet is placed in my hand by the third woman.
“And I’m Helene, André’s wife. I look at all the work you’re doing, and I think you might need a drink.”
Gaetan and Marc leave us and head over to the back of the pickup truck.
The women tell me in brief about their trip west and their lives and grown children. They ask about me and Josh, and I tell them we’ve been together for two years, and this year when I started to tell him I wanted to break up, he told me he had bought a van and wanted to take me on the road for a new adventurous life where we’d live fully every moment. It’s more than I intend to say. I insist that I enjoy making videos about our travels and finish my wine as Marc and Gaetan return, heavily loaded with tools. Marc has a four-foot metal rod in his hand. “In case the oil doesn’t work, eh?”
Soon, I’m down on my knees beside Gaetan, holding a long-handled socket wrench in place on the rusted nut while Marc slips the extension rod on the end.
The more exertion it takes, the more Quebecois the brothers sound. As Gaetan struggles to hold the socket wrench in place, I hear a “tabarnac” slip from his lips. It’s still not budging, so André helps Marc balance on the extension rod to put his body weight into the task.
Marc looks worried, as if any moment he’ll snap the bolt right off and plummet to the ground. “Esti de calice de marde,” he grunts.
Finally, with a blast like an out-of-tune trumpet, the nut moves a half turn. I squirt another shot of penetrating oil on that nut, and the guys repeat the procedure with one of the others. By this point, I’ve realized I’m just getting in the way. They get each nut moving, then hand the tire iron back to me to finish the job. Under Gaetan’s guidance, I remove the old tire and slip the spare into place, tighten the nuts until they’re all snug and lower the jack.
The brothers are laughing and patting me on the back when Josh interrupts to ask them to sign waivers so that we can use the video he’s shot.
“It’s going to look great,” he says.
Gaetan looks at me, and I say, “please, if you don’t mind” and he shrugs, and the three of them sign. The wives are packing up their picnic and I accompany the men to say my farewells.
“I’m sorry about interrupting your travel today. I hope you aren’t too delayed.”
“The boys had fun,” Jocelyn says. “They all get a little nervous without tools in their hands.” They all kiss me on the cheek and wish me well. Helene writes down our website address and Twitter handle and promises to watch.
I wave as they depart and Josh keeps shooting as they disappear in a cloud of dust.
“Damn. Wish I’d got the drone back up for that exit.”
We continue to Grasslands and drive straight to a hiking trail so I can walk up a hill and do tree pose while the evening sun sets the grass on fire. I’ve been standing on one leg for a couple of minutes when Josh comes in for a close-up.
“What’s a pose that says gratitude?” he asks.
“What?”
“Like maybe, the lesson should be about gratitude, not empowerment. So, what’s a gratitude pose?”
I try sitting with my eyes closed and my hands together at heart centre and I hear Josh say “perfect.” I hear the wind in the grass and prairie birds call and the sound of Josh walking around me to do a 360-degree pan and then he breaks into a closing narration.
“When you’re living on the road, you’re living off the goodwill of others. You have to learn to accept gifts of food or drink, of information or assistance. In a spirit of humility, you accept the gifts bestowed on you by the universe. Today, three beautiful souls from Quebec helped us get to Grasslands National Park in time for this spectacular sunset. We joyfully accept and honour their generosity. And who knows, maybe tomorrow we can give back to somebody else. Keep watching Vanlife with Josh and Siobhan to find out.”
He lets out a breath that tells me he’s finished. I open my eyes. We’re losing the light.
“Tomorrow we’re buying a replacement spare,” I say.
“What?”
“You said we might do something generous tomorrow for somebody else. Tomorrow we need to find a tire shop where we can get a new spare – otherwise, if we blow another tire, we’re fucked.”
“I’ve got a better idea,” Josh says, packing up his camera and tripod. “Tomorrow, we find a place with cell service, and I find us a tire company as a sponsor and we get a set of all-season radials.”
We head to the campground and cook up Kraft Dinner with salami chunks. The fridge has been acting up, so we don’t chance it with anything that needs to be kept cool. The rain that was threatening on the road hits so we have to eat in the van, windows shut tight. Six weeks of van life and Wes Anderson is getting pretty stinky. What Wes will be like when we get to our wintering grounds in Southern California, I don’t want to know.
It’s raining too hard to go to the washroom, so before bed I make Josh turn his back and I use my pee bucket. Something else the video never captures.
It’s been a long and exhausting day, and Josh is soon snoring beside me, but I can’t sleep. I’m thinking of Josh’s meditation on gratitude. Then it dawns me. I nudge Josh’s shoulder. When that doesn’t wake him, I elbow him in the back.
“Huh? Wha?”
“The three guys today, what were their names?”
“Their names?”
“Their names.”
“André.”
I nod. That’s one.
“René? Pierre?”
I roll over and close my eyes. Josh is asking if he’s close. “Can you give me a hint? Do they share names with politicians? Hockey players?”
I make a mental checklist for the next few days. Tomorrow, we get a new spare tire. If it’s sunny, we set up a clothesline and air everything out. We buy ice for the cooler, so we can eat something other than Kraft Dinner. And we get data service somewhere so Josh can look for a tire sponsor and I can check flights home.
Comments