If Your Car Is Moving… It’s Not Stuck

If Your Car Is Moving... It's Not Stuck

- jim Young

"If you have to choose between shovelling snow or digging out the car again... I'd probably pick Vodka." - anon

As a teenager I don't remember ever shovelling the laneway in the winter except maybe when one of my sister's boyfriends got stuck. And even then, it was only shovelled enough to free their car. What is particularly strange about this is that I was the only boy with 5 sisters in our family and typically my chores were male oriented tasks such as cutting the lawn and washing the windows in the summer.

        So why wasn't snow shovelling assigned to me? On the other hand, I don't think Dad really believed much in it. It seems Dad's attitude towards snow could be summed up with these four rules.

        1. You don't shovel something you can drive t hrough.

        2. Snow tires were made to be driven through snow.

        3. Never say "Whoa!" in a bad spot.

        4. If your car is moving... it's not stuck.

If the car is moving... it's not stuck!

You Don’t Shovel Something You Can Drive Through

It wasn’t just me that didn’t shovel our laneway in the winter. As the only other male in our household, neither did Dad. At least not that I can recall. Once or twice a year Dad might have paid Roy Lennox, the nearby farmer from whom he had purchased the land on which our house was built, to come down with his tractor and clear the laneway.

But that was usually only after a particularly large dumping of snow. Payment was most often in the form of a bottle of whiskey.

Snow Tires Were Made To Be Driven Through Snow

I never really heard Dad profess this adage but based on his first rule, Dad must’ve believed it. Dad bought his first four wheel drive truck after my sisters and I had all grown and left home. I remember my mother lamenting at the time, “Great! Now the laneway will never be cleared in the winter.”

Never Say “Whoa!” In A Bad Spot

This was an adage I did often hear my father repeat. I believe it came from Dad’s younger days working on his grandfather’s farm when Dad often had to drive his grandfather’s team of horses. Dad had been taught to never instruct the horses to “Whoa!” when they were travelling through mud or snow as their momentum was necessary to pull the wagon through a bad spot.

I guess the same principle can often apply to driving through a snow drift in a car. I remember as a young driver my father sitting in the passenger seat saying to me, “Don’t stop now! Don’t stop now! Don’t stop now!” More often than not it saved us from getting stuck.

If Your Car Is Moving… It’s NOT Stuck

Scientifically speaking, this rule of Dad’s was closely related to the “Never say ‘whoa’ in a bad spot,” rule as it too relied on the principle of momentum. 

Whenever one of my sisters or I or any one of our friends got stuck in the snow (usually right in our own laneway), going into the house to ask Dad for a push was always a last resort. It wasn’t because Dad ever denied us his assistance or begrudged helping us. I swear that sometimes that man had the patience of “Job”. 

We just dreaded the inevitable “You don’t need a push. You’re not stuck” lecture that we knew we were about to receive. Sometimes we secretly hoped that we really were stuck even if it meant having to call a tow truck.

Instead of giving us the push we had requested Dad would take the driver’s seat and tell us to stand back. The driver’s door was always left open during this process so Dad could better judge whether the car was actually moving and to what degree. “When your tires start to spin, STOP!” was a codicil to the “If your car is moving… it’s not stuck” rule which I always thought seemed a little contradictory to the “Never say ‘whoa!’ in a bad spot,” rule.

In hindsight I have learned that it’s important to apply the correct adage to the circumstance as in the following examples.  

“Look before you leap.” vs “He who hesitates is lost.”

“Too many cooks spoil the broth.” vs “Many hands make light work.”

“The early bird gets the worm.” vs “Haste makes waste.”

“Absence makes the heart grow fonder.” vs “Out of sight. Out of mind.”

“Nothing ventured, nothing gained.” vs “Better safe than sorry.”

“Clothes make the man.” vs “You can’t judge a book by its cover.”

“Birds of a feather flock together.” vs “Opposites attract.”

“You’re never too old to learn.” vs “You can’t teach an old dog new tricks.”

“The more the merrier.” vs “Two’s company; three’s a crowd.”

Each adage is sound advice on its own but only when applied in the proper context. 

But back to getting our car unstuck, even though according to Dad, it wasn’t really stuck. As Dad applied the gas the car would move no more than about ½“ forward before the wheels started to spin. Dad instantly released the gas and pressed the brake to keep the car from rolling back prematurely.

Impatiently I would ask, “Do you want me to push it now?”

“No,” Dad replied, “I don’t want you to get run over.”

“How can I get run over when the car’s stuck?” I knew better than to speak my sarcastic thoughts out loud.

Dad reversed the direction, applied the gas and the car moved back to its original position ½” back before the tires began to spin again and Dad immediately released the gas and pressed the brake once more.

Then Dad repeated the process. Most of the time we drove cars with standard transmissions requiring complex hand and leg coordination of the gas, clutch, brake, steering wheel and shifter consistent with precise timing. For the next few moments the car continued to move back and forth over the same ½” distance without any progress.

What we hadn’t noticed, as we stood watching in doubt, was that the direction was changing at quickening intervals each time. At some point the step of placing his foot on the brake between direction changes was omitted to expedite the rocking motion that began to use the weight of the vehicle to pack down the snow in front of the tires just enough to permit the automobile to begin to move ¾” in each direction. The ¾” eventually grew to 1”. Back and forth, back and forth Dad persistently repeated the process until the car began to move 2” then 3” at a time and more. 

At the exact required moment Dad would then invoke the “Never say ‘Whoa!’ in a bad spot” clause, put the pedal to the metal and the car would fly backwards out onto the road. Putting the car in neutral with the parking brake on, Dad would step out holding the driver’s door open for us to return the command of our vehicle back to us. With a grin Dad would proudly say, “See? You weren’t stuck,” as he headed back in the house to take up his cozy spot by the fire while we teenagers set off for our night of adventure.

We were too young at the time to realize we had just experienced our first adventure of the evening.

Yes, my friends… Those were the days.

- 30 -