They raise 'em right down in Beaver

BEAVER — Couple a things you should know about this place:

If you happen to drive a German-made vehicle, like, say, an Audi, do not break down here.

But if you do, get in touch with these guys: Mykel Gillins, Brandon Jensen and Dustin Godfrey.

They will more or less save your life.

A week ago last weekend, my family was en route to vacation in San Diego when we exited the freeway in the sleepy southern Utah farm town of Beaver and pulled into a Shell station to fill up.

When we went to leave, the car wouldn't start.

The battery wasn't dead, and I knew for an absolute fact we were not out of gas.

That exhausted my mechanical knowledge.

Compounding the problem was the fact that it was 10 o'clock on Friday night.

But across from the gas pumps, lo and behold, the lights were still on in the service bay.

Mykel Gillins, 18, was helping Brandon Jensen, also 18, install some tires on his car.

Seeing the hood up on my car was, to these guys, like a flame to a moth.

It also could be that my teenage daughter, Tori, helped.

In no time, they were assessing the situation like a NASCAR pit crew. You name it. They guessed it. Vapor lock. Timing belt. Bad gas. Fuel pump. Faulty starter.

They dispatched me inside to buy a can of Gunk engine starter. They shot it directly into the fuel line, and the engine roared to life, albeit briefly.

"Let's just keep doing that," I suggested.

"Naw," they said. "Give her too much, and she'll explode."

By this point, Dustin Godfrey, 19, had showed up, his shift at the Conoco on the other end of town over for the day. He had come from the Conoco to the Shell to shut down Friday night with his friends, Beaver style.

We had crawled ourselves right into an Alan Jackson song.

For a good hour, Mykel, Brandon and Dustin continued to lock wits with the German engine. They poked under the hood. They crawled under the car. They kicked stuff. Periodically, they would give her another shot of the ether.