This holiday, many families will be piling in a car to take a road trip to visit relatives. Depending on how far you have to travel, these can go smoothly or horribly wrong. You never really know with road trips, do you?

Like the week-long disaster my parents forced me to spend with them during Spring Break my Junior year in High School, where my brother upchucked an entire pound of fudge next to me in the back seat.

Or the two-hour trip down to Colorado Springs with my then three year-old and my three month-old, where my infant daughter’s non-stop screams drowned out the constant loop of The Wiggles that my son requested.

But none of these compare to a trip I took in graduate school with a friend, who I shall call, Kara.

We were in Columbus, Ohio at the time, and I had been invited to a friend’s wedding in Tennessee, where Kara was from. She wanted to head back home for the holiday weekend at the same time, so, naturally, ROAD TRIP!

I met her at her apartment, threw my duffle bag in her crammed-to-the-gills-with-dirty-laundry trunk and we set out for the open road.

Let me say here that Kara and I were friendly, but it wasn’t as if we were serious, “I would hold your hair back if you puked” kind of friends. Yet. At best, we were acquaintances before this trip. But that would change within the matter of hours.

We managed to make it about 45 minutes away from Columbus before her car started acting up. Then, the car died. On the highway. Right smack in the middle of a blind turn halfway up a hill. In the middle of Nowhere, Kentucky.

Feeling invincible, and hoping that a gas station was just around the bend, we decided to get out and try to push her car to a safer place. Because, we were stupid.

Two young, tiny girls, thinking they have the strength of Lou Ferigno, trying to push a car up a freakin’ hill was a sight that many passing motorists probably got a kick out of, I’m sure.

Because many passed us. MANY.

You would think that someone would have pulled over to help us out. But, nope! Thankfully, a police car finally came by, and, after making sure we were okay, he called a tow truck to haul us to the nearest mechanic.

In the middle of nowhere.

We were towed to a gas station where everyone in that town, all 13 of them, was camped out on lawn chairs out in front of the garage. Kara’s car needed some serious work that would require parts being ordered, and since it was a Friday evening, we had zero chance of driving her car away from that garage.

Kara desperately called her mom to come retrieve us, but her mom couldn’t make it out and suggested we rent a car and drive back to Tennessee.

Give up now? No way! Since we’d made it that far, we hunkered down for the night and would weigh our options in the morning.

Our toothless tow truck driver was kind enough to offer us a ride to the nearest hotel. Kara and I crammed in to the front cab, along with Kara’s 4 bags of laundry. Except, the cab was so jam packed, I couldn’t close the door, and as I tried to heave it closed, I leaned over Kara, who in turn landed in the tow truck driver’s lap.

That’s when Kara and I started laughing so hard we started crying. And I almost peed my pants. The sheer stress and ridiculousness of the day had hit us and made us hysterical with laughter.

And wouldn’t you know it, Tow Truck Guy didn’t bat an eye.

All we could think about as we pulled up to the hotel was heading over to the restaurant for a meal, a bottle of wine and a shower to wash the tow truck off of us. So, imagine our heartbreak when the lady at the front desk informed us that we were in a dry county.

No booze.

But if we wanted, we could wait until the she left her shift at 10 and catch a ride with her 20 miles to the next town to hit the bars with her.

As tempting as that sounded, we opted for the saddest dinner at the hotel’s diner and headed to bed early.

The next morning brought the promise of something actually going right for us. We rented a car at the nearest airport, drove to Kara’s mom’s house, changed for the wedding and headed out. We deserved a fun night after all of that shenanigans, right?

We followed the directions to the wedding, keeping an eye out for the Texaco gas station we were told would indicate when to turn left for the street to the church.

Except, the Texaco was actually an Aamco, and after 20 minutes of driving the wrong way, we finally figured out we needed to turn around.

We arrived at the chapel, parked our car, and walked in to the ceremony, only to hear “Ladies and Gentleman, I now present to you, Mr. and Mrs. Smith.”

We’d missed the whole freakin’ ceremony. I felt horrible. I’d come all this way to see my high-school best friend tie the knot, endured the road trip from hell, and I missed the whole thing!

But you can’t tell the bride on her big day that you missed a defining moment in her life, so Kara and I quickly ducked in to the back row before the bride and groom could make it that far down the aisle and pretended we were there the whole time.

There was some lag time between the wedding and reception, so Kara and I stopped at a bar on the way to chug down a drink and try to forget how badly the weekend had gotten screwed up.

Which was a good thing, because the reception was a CASH BAR.

So, no, the trip was not smooth. Not even close. Just when I thought things couldn’t get any worse, they did. And then I missed the wedding of a dear friend.

But in that trip, I cemented a friendship with Kara that would carry me through some pretty dark experiences in the coming couple of years, and for that, I am grateful that our car broke down.

And now I know why flasks are given as wedding party gifts.