by Liz Berry
A frosty tale from the Nourallah-Miller Feb 2020 Northeast Mini Tour
The thing about a blizzard is it sneaks up on you. At least my blizzard did.
I found myself watching one play out beyond the ticking wiper blades of our rental car as I sat dumbly in the passenger seat.
When we left Buffalo, it was just snow. Granted snow was a sight unfamiliar to my southerner’s eyes, but at first it was sort of pleasant. Watching it swirl down around the car as we cut through it was like seeing it on TV. Snow on TV means Christmas. Though Christmas was weeks in the past at this point in February, it was still sort of nice to imagine.
What did you really expect to happen? It’s February in upstate New York. Just the idea of February in any place so far from home where real weather is experienced should have been enough to veto this proposed trip completely. But this was a once in a life time opportunity. An… adventure.
Somewhere in the swirling whiteness miles and miles behind us is another car. This one contains Rhett Miller, described somewhere in my research of him as the “founding member of the venerable Old 97’s.” Singer, songwriter, calm, capable if slightly white knuckled driver in these unfamiliar conditions. Sitting in Rhett’s passenger seat is Salim Nourallah. Salim has a similarly artistic resume: singer, songwriter, respected Dallas music producer.
Right now the snow doesn’t care who we are. Right now, we’re just four Texans in varying states of bewilderment trying to get to Massachusetts.
Shirley, Massachusetts contains the Bull Run restaurant and what – at least on paper – should be show four of the six show run Rhett and Salim are doing on this mini tour. Of the northeast. In February.
Up until this moment, the tour proceeded beautifully. We started in Rochester, NY, then up to Toronto, back down to Buffalo. Buffalo seemed to be the best show yet: the venue was a converted church owned by Ani DiFranco. The sound was fantastic, the audience enthusiastic. There seemed to be no place to go, but up. We all left Buffalo, elated, wondering what exciting things the next show might hold.
The answer? Snow. The entire state of New York appeared to be made of it. The wind no longer swirled the fat flakes gaily around, but seemed to blow them with gale force past the windows. The orderly ranks of passing snow plows we watched doing their work in Toronto two days before, dwindled to just a plow or two trundling intermittently in front of us.
My husband Doug is at our helm. He’s doing a beautiful job staying calm. He knows I’m watching him. If his resolve starts to fray, mine goes straight out the window.
We start to watch the wrecks. First it appears to just be the fool hardy ones: the ones going too fast, the ones who speed up to overtake others going at more cautious, sensible speeds. We watch the ballet as one car after another spins in an almost graceful loss of traction. We pass the stranded semi trucks who seemed to breeze by us earlier when the snow began to quicken and thicken. I fear the semis most. They seemed to speed by fastest with no regard for tiny, helpless things like rented Corollas.
The funny thing about this weird, new age we all inhabit: disasters can be live streamed. I kept updates on our new precarious position posted to my Facebook. Oddly enough my mother watched the whole thing unfold and seemed to sense what Doug already knew: stay cool or Liz is going to start freaking out. She kept her comments calm and supportive.
I stayed in touch with the car behind us. Check in, guys. How are you doing? Where are you at? Salim and I have known each other for over a year. I would call us pen pals of a sort. Salim knows I’m afraid. Fear is just a characteristic. One of many: I’m tall. I have hazel eyes. I’m scared of everything.
Salim says if we can make it to the show in Shirley, he will try to play one of my favorite songs of his, “Don’t Be Afraid” – a song I’ve adopted as a personal happy thought since I heard it. I’ve carried that song with me through many genuinely scary moments in the last several months and I mentally add today to the list of those moments. In fact, it’s quickly heading for number one. With a bullet. The only thing between us and certain disaster is this nice, warm car. This car that I didn’t get any add-ons with. No extra crash coverage, no road side assistance. Nothing.
Just like that it happens. I feel the car lose traction. We start to skid. Doug, still perfectly calm, tells me to hold on. All I can think is we’re about to crash a rental car 1800 miles from home and I didn’t buy the crash coverage. What do you even do when you crash a car that’s not yours?
We don’t whip around 180 or 360 degrees the way we watched the other floundering cars. Doug regains control and maneuvers us to a stop deep in the left shoulder of the road. He goes outside to inspect, the wool overcoat we found for him at a thrift store back in Rochester snaps in the wind as his cheeks quickly turn red. He reports back, “We’re stuck.” The snow is too deep on the shoulders. We were mired the minute we drifted over.
I text Salim, “We slid off. We’re stuck.” I can’t think of anything else to do… so I live stream it. I put our predicament live on Facebook for my friends and family to watch. My naturally dramatic side takes over. I’m thinking about cold, certain death… not about tow trucks and the inconvenience of perhaps missing the show tonight. Even missing the show was a thought I wasn’t prepared to deal with as we had all of Salim’s tour merchandise – t-shirts, cds and records – in our trunk. The second we were trusted with the merchandise, I immediately assigned myself indispensable status. Hand to the forehead in fine, southern belle fashion, How could the show possibly go on without ALL THE TSHIRTS?!
Suddenly, a car pulls over on the shoulder of the oncoming side of traffic. A tiny figure clad head to toe in a snowsuit, snow shovel in hand, springs out of the vehicle and makes a run for us. I like to imagine she is some sort of snow flurry superhero who lives for days like these where she can shoot valiantly out of her car, This is it! This is what I’ve trained for! No thanks necessary, citizen. I must go. I’m needed elsewhere.
The figure immediately starts shoveling snow away from the tires. One tire, two, three, four. Doug reaches out a hand like he wants to help. The figure swats him away.
A second person pulls over to assist. This is insanity. We watched countless people spin out and sit by the side of the road. No one stopped to help. No one helped any of the other stranded drivers – at least that I saw. Two people stopped for us? Two people are helping us?
I roll down the window to hear what they are doing. The person behind is going to push us, rock us and hopefully with the added momentum we can get free and speed away back in to the flow of traffic. The woman is watching traffic. She will scream through the window when it’s time to go, go GO!!!! This is attempted once, twice, three times. The wheels aren’t even spinning (we figure out later it was probably the car’s automatic traction control trying to keep us safe). Show Shovel Lady is screaming at us. Why aren’t we going? As she’s scooped away the snow, she sees we don’t even have snow tires. WE’RE JUST DUMB TOURISTS, I wail helplessly, WE DON’T KNOW ANY BETTER. She tells us the area is expecting 20” and to just find a motel. Give up.
Give up? Us? Mwahahahahaha, a tiny voice in my frantic mind laughs. My guys need me! I marvel briefly at the thought. Three days ago, Rhett Miller was just a nice man, a friend of Salim we didn’t really know. Today he and Salim are “my guys.” What a difference a blizzard makes. Trauma bonding, I text to Salim. Some day back in Texas where there are no blizzards, we’ll all reminisce about that time in New York when tried not to die. He agrees with me.
Somehow, the plan finally works and we squirt haphazardly back in to traffic. We are shaken. How is this even happening? What if we really crashed? What if that happens again? What if we aren’t so lucky next time? Doug says he had a plan. He would have gotten us out. He then admits he was the cause. He sped up to pass someone. Just like most of the other people sitting lamely by the side of the road now. Oh, good, so we deserved that. Awesome.
“People are inherently good,” I text Salim with a string of sob faced emojiis. Good Samaritans helped us! Even though Snow Shovel Samaritan peppered that assistance with more than a little invective, I could not have been more grateful.
Back on the road, driving becomes a purgatory of grey and white. Endless. Morale is low. Gas is about to be an issue. Dammit, it would be really nice to find a bathroom too.
We are scared to stop. Worried to become icebound again, but we try. The first attempt is thwarted when we turn in to the Trucks side instead of the Cars area at the next available truck stop. There was no way for us to back up or get back over. So we sigh and pull back out.
Next gas station, Doug manages to pull us over and get the gas pumping. I would really really love a restroom break right about now, but I can’t even see the gas station entrance through the blowing snow. He asks me if I want to try to make a break for it. No, just go on. We again rejoin the crawling flow of traffic.
Albany was the goal through this ordeal. Albany was clear. I figured if we can just make it there, we could finally see a break in the misery. Ultimately, though as we trekked the snow continued on its path and covered Albany as well. No other choice, we just kept going.
Then just as quickly as it began, the worst is over. We shook the snow off our tail and somewhere near New Canaan, New York, I got my bathroom break, a packet of banana chips and a souvenir New York fridge magnet. Back on the road once more, I saw the sky for the first time in 8 hours.
So long, blizzard, don’t talk to me, or Doug or our rented Corolla ever again.
Crossing in to Massachusetts, I was suddenly afraid it was just a respite, just a calm pocket in between storms and we were headed back in to it again, but the road never whited out again. It was just wet and cold.
Last communique had Rhett and Salim still quite a way behind us, so we checked in to our hotel, dropped our stuff and headed for the venue. There was parking behind the restaurant, beyond a picturesque covered bridge. We gathered the merch suitcases and headed over the bridge. When we walked in the back door, Salim greeted us. I was astonished. Somehow they made really good time after leaving the majority of the storm behind and managed to catch up with and overtake us. He hugged me. Today was 100 years long. Buffalo was another century. I was so happy to see him. Exhausted and dazed, I almost expected to blink my eyes and suddenly be back in the car, lost in the hazy grey white again.
Salim shepherded us up some stairs, instructed us to drop our cases and go find our table. Eat something. We’ll worry about everything later.
We did. I was suddenly so thirsty. I couldn’t stop drinking. The waitress asked me if we needed anything else, I said water. She pointed at a carafe already on the table. I gulped it eagerly. Finally, a tiny bit calm, I enjoyed some food. Doug ate quickly and excused himself to his station where he started opening cases, removing t-shirts and arranging them to their best advantage. I watched him across the room. Four days in and he was already a deft hand at this. Set up the items, put the cases out of sight, talk to any early birds who happened to wander by before the show started. Doug hates to admit it, but he’s a natural salesman.
Calmer by the minute, dinner consumed, the lights start to dim. There he is. My friend Salim takes the stage. The show begins and I know we are ok. A moment I only hoped for hours ago, is finally at hand.
Salim sings “Don’t Be Afraid” for his friends Liz and Doug. He tells the audience what we went through together today. I am grateful for the darkness because the corners of my eyes start to prick and I try not to cry. That was a sweet thing for him to do. I love that song.
Later, some sweet ladies, friends of Salim we met at the merch table offer to take a picture of the four of us together: Rhett, me, Doug and Salim. A fitting memento: Me. My guys. We are blizzard proof. I wouldn’t change a minute of that scary, amazing day for anything.
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