Something To Blog About

Irony. It's a funny thing. Alanis Morisette wrote a song about it. Not that I'm a huge fan of hers, but she does make a point.

Mr. Play It Safe was afraid to fly
He packed his suitcase and kissed his kids goodbye
He waited his whole damn life to take that flight
And as the plane crashed down he thought
"Well isn't this nice..."~jagged little pill album

And so it is purely ironic in the wry satire that is my life, with me being an admittedly proud speed demon, that the only accident I've ever had took place at speeds too low to register on the speedometer. Yep. Today. In a parking lot. Right smack dab up against an innocuous parked car. I'd underestimated the space I had to turn into a slot and scraped another car.

I reversed away from the car I'd just rolled into and parked next to it. I was thinking a foot long dent and maybe some scrapes. Dollar signs were ringing in my head. Increased insurance premiums. How many points is that on my DMV? I got out to survey the damage. Scratched up the rear fender, the rear panel and the driver's side door. The three people who saw the whole action were watching me to see if I'd jump into the van to flee. I'm sure they saw my face go white when I looked at the car's license plate to note the fresh off the lot plastic placards where a license plate should be. And then my eyes travelled upward to see the shiny silvery emblem of the car's maker and I just about peed myself. Couldn't slide into a shot out run down Pinto (are there still any Pintos on the road?) No, I had to do it big and disfigure a Mercedes Benz. Crap!

But wait...It gets better!

I was standing in my open door trying to decide how best to locate the car's owner. I turned toward my van to open Willie's door while I instructed The Middle the open his door to get some air, and what do I see? A head and shoulders disappearing into the smashed car's driver seat. The owner had come back and had absently gotten into his car and started it, rolled down the window and put the car in gear. Why, oh why could I have not displayed some of the slow witted sluggish thought processes that I've had for two weeks while I've learned my new job? Why?

I called out to him from the open door, "Dude! I just hit your car." Stupid, stupid, stupid. He was going to drive away. He hadn't seen the damage. I was off the hook. As far as anyone was privy to, except for now of course, The Middle, my pristine accident free driving record could remain unchallenged. The whole driver returning thing happened so fast, if I'd delayed turning around for even 30 seconds to tell The Middle to open his door for air, the driver would have driven away and I would have missed the whole confession. But I hadn't delayed. And it was the right thing to do. Crap!

The guy was actually pretty cool. And he let me know that the car wasn't brand new. It was a 2002. A cop buddy of his had put the dealer placards on his car because he was getting pulled over at least once every three days. "They see a black man driving a Mercedes and think it's stolen." I don't get that logic. I actually wanted to ask him So how is a black man driving a brand new Mercedes different? But he volunteered, "I guess they think it would be harder to steal it from a dealership than off the streets."

While we were in the process of gathering insurance information he said "Oh, this has to be private. I've already got a few points and I have a new insurance agency. Let's handle this privately. Private would be best." He wouldn't even take my info. We exchanged names and phone numbers. He said he has friends who do auto body work and will get a cheap estimate. He said that since there weren't any actual dents, it would mean a sand and buff and a new coat of paint. Whew!

While this post was supposed to be about surviving my first two weeks at my new job, it is this instead. More later when I find out how much this will cost. Oh yeah. And still more when The Beloved sees the nice basketball sized dent in my front bumper.