While I Was Gone...
(Cross Posted on Working Stiffs)
Nothing exciting ever happens around here…until I go away.
This phenomenon began years ago when we still had horses. Hubby and I took off for the day and went to the Amish country. We had a lovely day. But when we returned home, we learned of what had transpired during our absence. My dad had opened the gate to get something out of the tractor shed and all three of our horses got out. What makes this especially terrifying is the fact we live on a major truck route. Two lanes of country road with semi-tractor trailers barreling along it. Apparently it had taken both of my elderly parents and my cousins who lived next door at the time AND the guests they had for dinner to wrangle the beasts and return them to their pasture.
My pulse still goes up just thinking about it.
Another time, while I was away for the day visiting a friend, two cars collided head-on in front of my parents’ house. One of the cars ended up in their driveway on FIRE. The flames scorched their maple tree. Neither the tree nor the driver (a friend of my parents no less) survived.
After that one, my mom told me I wasn’t allowed to go anywhere ever again. She couldn’t take the stress.
Last week and weekend, I was in Baltimore for Bouchercon. Sunday morning, I made my daily phone call to my mom to make sure she was okay. She was fine, but breathless, as she told me about the police that had pulled a car over in front of my house (I live two doors away…within spying distance). The cops put the two occupants of the car in the back seat of the cruiser and had the car towed.
It was probably nothing more than a vehicle breakdown. But my crime writer’s imagination conjured up drunken driving and drug busts. I still haven’t found out the details.
And then, yesterday morning I went to the local post office to buy a book of stamps and was greeted by a wanted poster on the door complete with an artist’s rendition of a man’s eyes peering through a sky mask. I paused to read and learned that the day I left for Baltimore, one of our township’s post offices had been robbed. I rushed home and did some Googling to find this. Imagine! An armed robber holding up a post office no more than five miles from my house!
And I missed it!
Again.
As far as I know, no one has been arrested. The likeness in the artist’s sketch could have been ANYBODY. I’m locking my doors, even during the day. Usually, the only interlopers we have coming onto our porch are raccoons and possums. Now there’s a guy with federal charges hanging over his head on the loose.
Yes, my crime writer’s imagination kicked in with the possibility that the two events were linked. Could the robber have been nabbed right at the end of my driveway?
Unlikely. According to my spy AKA Mom, no weapons were drawn and no handcuffs were involved.
But then again, Mom is having eye surgery in a couple weeks. Maybe she didn’t see everything that was going on. Hmmm…
Nothing exciting ever happens around here…until I go away.
This phenomenon began years ago when we still had horses. Hubby and I took off for the day and went to the Amish country. We had a lovely day. But when we returned home, we learned of what had transpired during our absence. My dad had opened the gate to get something out of the tractor shed and all three of our horses got out. What makes this especially terrifying is the fact we live on a major truck route. Two lanes of country road with semi-tractor trailers barreling along it. Apparently it had taken both of my elderly parents and my cousins who lived next door at the time AND the guests they had for dinner to wrangle the beasts and return them to their pasture.
My pulse still goes up just thinking about it.
Another time, while I was away for the day visiting a friend, two cars collided head-on in front of my parents’ house. One of the cars ended up in their driveway on FIRE. The flames scorched their maple tree. Neither the tree nor the driver (a friend of my parents no less) survived.
After that one, my mom told me I wasn’t allowed to go anywhere ever again. She couldn’t take the stress.
Last week and weekend, I was in Baltimore for Bouchercon. Sunday morning, I made my daily phone call to my mom to make sure she was okay. She was fine, but breathless, as she told me about the police that had pulled a car over in front of my house (I live two doors away…within spying distance). The cops put the two occupants of the car in the back seat of the cruiser and had the car towed.
It was probably nothing more than a vehicle breakdown. But my crime writer’s imagination conjured up drunken driving and drug busts. I still haven’t found out the details.
And then, yesterday morning I went to the local post office to buy a book of stamps and was greeted by a wanted poster on the door complete with an artist’s rendition of a man’s eyes peering through a sky mask. I paused to read and learned that the day I left for Baltimore, one of our township’s post offices had been robbed. I rushed home and did some Googling to find this. Imagine! An armed robber holding up a post office no more than five miles from my house!
And I missed it!
Again.
As far as I know, no one has been arrested. The likeness in the artist’s sketch could have been ANYBODY. I’m locking my doors, even during the day. Usually, the only interlopers we have coming onto our porch are raccoons and possums. Now there’s a guy with federal charges hanging over his head on the loose.
Yes, my crime writer’s imagination kicked in with the possibility that the two events were linked. Could the robber have been nabbed right at the end of my driveway?
Unlikely. According to my spy AKA Mom, no weapons were drawn and no handcuffs were involved.
But then again, Mom is having eye surgery in a couple weeks. Maybe she didn’t see everything that was going on. Hmmm…
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