Humble Pie and Buying Gas

Summer 1990

I had been living in Germany for seven years by this time, with my French husband and our three kids, making trips back to visit my family and friends in the States every second year or so. This summer of 1990, I enjoyed several weeks in my home town of Palos Verdes, a suburb of Los Angeles, and a dear friend had lent me his Mazda Miata.

The Miata was such a zippy little sports car, and I had been enjoying toodling along over the hills of Palos Verdes with the top down, taking in the red tile roofs, bougainvillea climbing up trellises, and the ocean sparkling in the sun. More than once I had to stop for peacocks crossing the road.

The  Palos Verdes peninsula offers views that take your breath away. On the south end, you can see Catalina Island 42 km, 22 miles, off the coast. The remarkably deep channel between Palos Verdes and Catalina serves as a highway for whales making their annual trek between their winter breeding grounds off Baja California and their summer hangout off Alaska. This veritable  cetacean freeway attracts whale watchers who spot and count them for scientific research. On the other side of the peninsula, a hilltop view takes in the whole L.A. basin, on a clear day spotting the Hollywood sign and the mountains on up to Malibu north of L.A., and every beach town, Pacific Palisades, Santa Monica, Manhattan, Hermosa, Redondo, creating the Queen’s Necklace, a glittering view at night. I did not take growing up in such a beautiful spot for granted, and I was reveling in being back home.

The wonderful break from routine during that Summer of 1990 was about to end. My flight back to Dusseldorf was the next day, and it was time to return the Miata to my friend with my thanks and a full tank of gas.

For the past seven years, I had been driving a solid German-engineered BMW station wagon, totally appropriate for a family of five traveling the Autobahn of Germany and highways of France. It had been seven years of filling up a large tank with gasoline measured in liters, paid for in Deutsche Marks, and taxed at a rate that made gas cost four times American prices. That was my life.

This darling little car was a different kettle of fish.

I drove into the self-serve station and pulled right up to the Unleaded pump.  I got out of the car and tried to pop open the the fuel flap. It didn’t respond to my touch, neither springing open with a press, nor clicking open with a pull.

Ah, I thought, there is a lever in the car…So I climbed back in and looked first on the dashboard, pressing buttons that were unfamiliar to me…then on the middle panel between the bucket seats, flicking levers and switches, then on the side door panel, then searching for a lever or button on the floor. Nothing popped that lid open.

After five minutes of looking, getting more and more frantic, I still had not discovered how to open the flap.  By this time there were three cars in line behind me.  I finally had to turn to the nice Hell’s Angel on his Harley who was filling up next to me. I said, “Excuse me, Sir…do you know where the release lever to the gas tank is on this car?”

With his help, I found it.  (It was inside a second compartment between the bucket seats.)  “Thank you so much, Sir,” and with relief, I hurriedly took the nozzle off the pump hook, placed it into the tank neck and pressed.

Nothing came out.

So I took the nozzle out, shook it a few times (to get the juices flowing), and put it back in, twisting it around to seek where it found its best seal, and pressed.

Nothing.

I hung it up again on the hook (thinking I could ‘reboot’ like a computer), stuck it into the tank and pressed again.

Nothing happened.

By this time,  fifteen minutes had gone by and the people behind me were pulling out and getting in the lines all around me.

One last futile effort to get the gas flowing, doing the same things hoping it would magically kick in…and I had to admit defeat.  How out of it was I, that this simple transaction, something I had done many times before, flummoxed me so utterly?

I was embarrassed; here I was, born and bred in America, with a wide range of experiences as an adult, someone who had been driving for 20 years, and I couldn’t figure out how to fill up the tank in my very own country. I had no choice, I was going to have to slink into the station and ask the cashier for help.

But slink I did not want; I needed to face this humiliation like an adult, be the grown-up competent independent American woman that I was. So I screwed up my courage, squared my shoulders, and with barefaced determination I sauntered into the shop, right up to the counter in front of everybody, and said:

“Zee gas…’ow do I do eet?”

The cashier smiled and said, “You have to pay for it first, with a credit card or cash.”

Oh!  Okay…”ow do I know ‘ow many I geev you? I do not know ‘ow many I need…”

He answered, “Just give me what you think it might be…at the end come back in and I will give you change, or you will owe me more.”

Okay, I think. Now we’re cookin’!

And I started to figure out how much to pay him…Hmm, I know what I’d pay to fill it up in Germany… the sign says it costs $1.12 a gallon…I need a full tank…My BMW has a 50-liter tank, what does the Miata have?…there are 3.79 liters to the gallon… so that’s how many gallons?  And, the exchange rate is 1.7 Deutsche Marks to the dollar…Gol dang it, this is hard, let’s see…

That calculation on the spot was way too complex for me, people were starting to honk…so I pulled out my wallet and paid what I thought was about right. I laid down 20…40…60…80 dollars.

“Eez enough, yes?” The cashier smiled and said, “That should do it.”

The final bill was $12.86.

Man, gas in the USA was cheap back then.  But the humble pie, that cost a lot.

© Sarah Knightwriter