Overwhelming Anxiety

I had a panic attack this weekend.  This is a feeling I haven’t felt in a long time.  It wasn’t due to me being a recruiter during a recession, the 15% drop in my stock account’s value the past month, political issues, UGA’s loss to Alabama, my three sick aunts, or my son acting out at school.  No, this one surprised me.  I went out to get gas on Saturday and every station I went to was out.  We took my car because it was lowest on gas and needed a refill while we ran errands.  The first seven stations we passed were out, so we opted to come home instead of wasting more gas looking and hope that on Monday or Tuesday we could find some gas for my car or I’d have to walk to work (only 2 miles).  I took the long way home to try Costceo with my less than 1/8 of a tank remaining. 

In the Costco parking lot we were stuck behind a driver who apparently forgot while pedal was the gas and which was the break.  Tension started to build as we thought we could see they had gas available.  Then we could see the line, but we were still stuck behind the slow driver.  She pulled into a space and we got by in time to pull in line and have a Costco employee come up to us and say they were about to be out, but we could sit in line if we wanted to risk it.  He let two more cars in behind us and then blocked off the lane.  We knew he wasn’t expecting us to get any, but we had no other hope.  We sat in line watching people fumble with their credit cards and all the while our tension grew.  When an SUV would pull up I’d turn my car off and wait to save gas since it took four minutes at least for them to fill up.  We debated the choice Costco could have made to ration the gas per customer and never decided if which way was actually fair or smart for them as a business.  Finally the line moved, but that was only because the front line of pumps went dry.  We knew it was a matter of minutes before the whole station was dry.  Meanwhile another Costco employee came to our window to try to sell us on something.  We almost bit his head off.  I knew the panic was kicking in and tried to take deep breaths.

We had been in line for 30 minutes and were two cars away from filling up and an SUV driver pulled up and started to slowly drain our gas.  We could accept that, she waited her turn, but then she got back in her car.  We were to the point of sweating in our car with nerves hoping she would be at the tanks when it clicked.  Finally it did and the hybrid in front of us had his turn, but he didn’t know who to work the two card system of first using his Costco card and then his credit card.  We knew fumes had to be the only thing remaining.  He moved and we rolled forward.  I had my cards ready as I jumped out, stuck them in the machine quickly with shaking hands only to get no gas.  I was the first driver not to get gas.  Everyone across the row sighed as their pumps stopped working too.  We all looked at each other, shrugged and smiled as if acknowledging each other’s pain.

We decided to call it a day and we deal with Atlanta’s Gas Shortage another time.  As we drove the last mile home, I said, just in case let’s check the BP where earlier in the week they were charging $4.59/gallon.  My hands were still shaking and my wife agreed it was worth a try since it was only an extra two blocks.  As I turned we saw a line.  We just got in line without knowing if it was an accident or the Promised Land.  It moved as drivers in front of us got out of the way.  We pulled in on the wrong side for my tank, but figured I could stretch the line over my Accord.  But wait, nobody was in the car in front of me.  WTF?  I did a u-turn in the parking lot as my wife got out to block someone from taking my spot.  I backed up, rear bumper to rear bumper to the abandoned car in front of mine.  I was two feet short of the pump reaching still. 

I started to get the shaking hands again as adrenaline ran through my veins.  What could we do now?  We were out of the long line we just got through and just before we gave up, the lady returned to her abandoned Range Rover.  She had gone inside to pre-pay.  She tried to pump, but it didn’t work.  They weren’t out of gas, just the pre-pay didn’t work.  I asked her to go get her money back and give it to me.  I’d put it on my credit card and pump for her.  Before she took me up on that, it started to work.  She only paid for $60, so she was relatively quick.  I backed up into my spot as she rolled out and filled up to the $60 limit this station imposed.  I felt a relaxing feeling start pouring over me as I passed the five gallon mark.  When my tank was full I stopped shaking completely.  I ended up paying $4.39/gallon and was happy to do so.

My son sat patiently through all of this in the back seat enjoying the excitement.  Here’s picture from one of my co-workers from what he saw on Friday in Atlanta.