A Pete in shining armor

So there I was...  Wheeler Middle School parking lot, hood open, hair pulled back, sleeves rolled up, hands black from grease, jumper cables out, acting like I had the first clue as to what was wrong with my truck this time, when Pete rolled up.  "Need some help?" he says.  After having just sent out a mass help text to some friends and realizing that most of these friends cars aren't legal enough to make it on base anyways, I graciously accepted Pete's offer to help.  Pete, a 6" 4' 230 pound airplane mechanic in his mid twenties, has been stationed on Oahu for the last 6 months and after having been recently stranded himself could easily relate to the feelings associated with breaking down.  Now, I don't know if any of you have ever rope towed before, but this was my first time, and let's just say I was stoked I had cold beers in the fridge, because it was one of the sketchier things I've done in a while, and let's face it, I do a lot of sketchy things!   We pretty much had to remove the entire front end of my truck, which we came to find was being held on by two screws, some surfboard resin, and what looked like black silly putty.   Next, the question became, what can we tie the rope to that will actually hold, considering how much rust there was.  We first tried a rope Pete already had in his truck, but after a shady dry run around the school premises, of course passing several of my students, we both decided we needed more than 10 feet of rope to execute this safely.  Pete said he needed to buy a tow rope anyways, so I waited while he went to buy one.  After a good half hour of Pete tying and retying different ropes I came to a few conclusions.  Number one, soldiers need better training in knot tying, number two, I'm definitely a Taurus, as it took every ounce of strength I had to not voice my opinion as to the best way to go about handling this situation, and number three,  after all of that we had only gained four more feet of space between our cars!  Long story getting longer... we were ready to make our way to the North Shore.  We only had about 14 miles to go, but we took snake road and for those of you who don't know the drive you can probably gather from the name it is not straight.  We came up with hand signals for slowing down but the bottom line for me was... DON'T TAKE YOUR EYES OFF HIS BUMPER!!!  I was without power, which basically means quite literally you are powerless when it comes to steering and breaking.  My truck would get going faster than his car and I had to literally stand on my brake pedal to keep from hitting him.  After the long, steep, slither all I could smell was brakes and luckily Pete didn't have the back end on his bronco so communication was easy... I just did a lot of yelling!  Upon our safe return I figured the least I could do was offer Pete some beers.  Three beers, a dozen cigarettes, and countless tales of military men and their debaucheries, I felt like by I had repaid the favor simply by listening!  And I thought I had stories!  Military guys are nuts!  But nuts or not Pete truly was my knight in shining armor.  God Bless America!