Mikaela Wegner — Co-editor

My mum used to call it “The Sunday Night Blues,” a term to encompass all the feelings that come with the last day of either the weekend or any sort of break; That Sunday Night (or in this case Tuesday) after 6 p.m. when the reality of Real Life starting up again hits hard.

I was having my fair share of The Sunday Night Blues last Tuesday, particularly with the realization this would be my last Spring Break ever. Obviously, the way to avoid such distress is filling the time with happy distractions; I decided my happy distraction would be ice cream.

Granted, I had a job interview earlier that afternoon, so I thought with school starting the next day I had the perfect duo of justification for spending what little I had in my wallet.

Also in for my plan, my fiancé joined me for ice cream at 9:30 p.m. I wanted Culvers, but he wanted Dairy Queen. I had not been a very fun person to be engaged to the previous week while job hunting and wedding planning, so I decided to make up for some of it by letting him choose our dessert destination.

It was a fine drive, nothing out of the ordinary, until we hit AC/DC’s Highway to Hell. Starting from the children’s dentist on main street up to the traffic lights across from Centerpoint Church, it felt like the Indiana Jones ride in Disneyland.

Right before driving under those traffic lights, I felt the car “THUD” into a massive pothole and, like the sound of a door squeaking right after you hear a doorknob turn, a blaring “POP” followed. I looked at my fiancé with eyes asking, “Was that normal?” The car answered before he could with a dragging noise under the right side of the car.

We pulled into the Advance Auto Parts parking lot across from the Livestock restaurant, one of those stores you don’t know is in Sioux Center until present situations force you into its vicinity. The tire rim touched the cement. A friend of ours had to come drop off a jack after we found out there wasn’t one in the car. Common sense lesson learned: Never change a tire on a slanted surface.

Skipping forward, with a spare tire secured I decided I was definitely paying for my fiancé’s ice cream after he spent 30 minutes in the cold, with me holding a little iPhone flashlight to aid. We got to DQ, but realized it was 9:59 p.m. -– those high school employees were already out of dodge.

I love my fiancé, and his patience throughout this situation made me love him even more. We stopped at Walmart for some Ben and Jerry’s; he got Brownie Batter and I got Talenti’s Coffee Cookie Crumble (which beat my fiancé’s ice cream on Yuka, by the way).

We drove back to my fiancé’s house, ready to savor the last few moments of Spring Break I had left. I held my breath driving under those traffic lights again, but thankfully all remained well. We passed the children’s dentist, and my fiancé slightly swerved to avoid another pothole. “THUD, POP.”

I laughed for a second, thinking, “Oh my goodness, could you imagine?” But then we kept driving, and the car laughed at us with that all too familiar dragging noise. My fiancé pulled into the parking lot connecting The Fruited Plain and Darlo’s Auto Shop.

I watched my fiancé walk around the car, turn on his phone flashlight, and drop his head back laughing. Not only did the spare tire pop, it completely bent in down the middle.

Not having a spare-spare tire, we called it quits and walked back to my fiancé’s house, 10:30 p.m., 30 degrees, with ice cream in hand.

I know that for myself, I had never quite had a Sunday Night Blues experience quite like that one. I’m going to go out on a limb and ask the city, along with the many other angry emails and letters I’m sure they’ve received, and ask that they please fix main street. Maybe the ASB Dome could make a kind donation to this well-loved road. Maybe Dordt University can make a contribution to honor the hundreds of family members traveling to Sioux Center for May 2023’s graduation.

Regardless of how it’s done, please Sioux Center fix your streets.

And please don’t give my fiancé a ticket for overnight parking.

Photo credit: Mikaela Wegner