This really is the City of Angels...

After shopping for groceries at a Von's the other day, I started my car, and I heard a loud, whirring sound. I thought I'd run out of oil or that I needed steering wheel fluid because I couldn't cut the wheel, but it turns out that a rat had crawled under the hood of my car while I was inside (probably seeking shelter from the cold weather we've been having here), and somehow managed to take off one of my fan belts—not chew it off, but completely remove it altogether. It was quite an elaborate job, but this rat was obviously a fan of McGyver.

So, I manage to get it 4 blocks down the street to an Autozone on Pico Blvd (Of course it's the weekend, and there are no repair shops open. There would be no story otherwise). I'm pissed, I'm freezing, and I'm a girl. What the hell do girls know about fixing cars? Well, a lot apparently.

I thought she was just a cashier or a phone operator, but I was way off. Lori asked me to pop the hood to see what the problem was. The next thing I know, this girl is on her hands and knees in the freezing rain, fixing my car. I told her that there was no need for her to do all of that, and that she'd gone way above and beyond the call of duty, but she just smiled and said she was used to it. After all, she rides her bike to and from work every day, despite the torrential downpours we've been having here lately.

I was so impressed, and so grateful. If it were me, I don't know if I would have been so selfless. I don't do well with cold weather (I am a Floridian after all), and I sure as hell wouldn't be so willing to dig around under the hood of a stranger's car knowing that there's a dead rat lurking around there somewhere.

Well, for the next 2 hours that it took to fix it, Lori and I joked around about the "hood rat," and talked about life, relationships, and her love of cars. I found out that she's in mechanics school, she's a violinist, and she grew up with good Southern values (her father was from Texas) despite living her whole life in California. I knew that a regular mechanic would have charged me an astronomical amount of money for the amount of labor that went into repairing that damn car, but she didn't ask for anything. I could tell that all she wanted was to talk to someone and do what she loves to do most: fix cars. Never have I met someone so kind, and so willing to help someone they don't even know.

Life is so funny sometimes. Even in the oddest or stickiest of situations, something good can be drawn from the experience. In this case, it was Lori. If it wasn't for this extremely unusual and unfortunate incident, I probably never would have met her. I also wouldn't have gotten home that night, or, if I did, I would have had to inconvenience one of my friends to come and pick me up and then chance leaving my car unattended in a questionable neighborhood. I don't know what I did to deserve the treatment that I got the other night, but I must be in check with karma. Lori was my little glimmer of hope that day.

Sometimes, I feel ravaged by life out here—the constant struggle to survive, the competition, the extremeness of it all; but she truly brightened my day, and I felt compelled to tell the whole world about her.

A lot of people would probably agree that Los Angeles isn't so deserving of its title, but every so often, someone or something comes along to prove that miracles do happen, and that angels do in fact, exist. You just have to believe.

~Alexx Calise