Oh, What a Night!

Dear Gangaroonies, et alii,

So there I was snuggled in my bed, Loki under my right arm, Sophia near my left as I took off my reading glasses, at 11:30 PM, Dec. 31, 2012, and placed Michael Grunwald's New New Deal in the night stand, turned off the light, and thought: This is the way for an old dude to spend New Year's Eve--quiet, sober, surrounded by his loved ones, and off to dreamland.

We wakened about 2:30 AM to the sound of a crash which at first I thought was just another avalanche of snow breaking free of my neighbor Mike's steel roof and sliding against my siding on its way to the ground (our houses are very close).  Loki had bolted from the bed in a great leaping and barking which was not to be suppressed however many times I advised him it was only the snow.  He ran to the front door and kept it up like a good watchdog.  I heard voices.  I popped the front door open and saw a Dodge Caravan about ten feet to my immediate right as if trying to get up the porch steps, grinding itself into the dirt where my beautiful Magnolia bush used to be, the chain link fence broken out of the ground, and the wooden fence which joined it at the corner of the property reduced to shards.

The driver, an inebriated Puerto Rican, was standing alongside the front bumper asking me if I could help him get his car back on the street.  Behind the car were the trails of the path on the clear street showing its swerve to the left, up Mike's walkway, over the snow piled on the tree lawn, and into the corner of my yard. Now I'm in my nightshirt trying to tell him I'll get some clothes on first while he digs out his insurance information.  I went back into the house to get dressed while they spun the front wheels which, though bald, were nonetheless remarkably good at spraying everywhere the fabulously soft loam in which my bush had heretofore nestled.

Back outside I found the front wheels now at least a foot deep, unable to rock back and forth. He was sloshed and aromatic, weeping about how I should not call the police, about how his baby--his nine-month old baby--was in the car and he needed to get him home.  "I had a few beers, I'm human," he slobbered.  "I'm human too, but I had a bush and two fences not all that long ago and I'm pissed," I replied.

"Oh God, I am so sorry, maybe I should die," he went on maudlinly.  "I think this has more to do with you and the beers than it has to do with God," I suggested.  "As for dying you can defer that until you get some incurable disease. Right now, you have a wife, a baby, and all sorts of responsibilities which will dawn on you once you sleep it off.  You shouldn't be driving."

His wife, also a little beer-breathy, was shuffling through a handful of papers trying to find the insurance information.  I went into the house to record pertinent stuff from the papers she presented.  Once outside again I heard her husband continue his profuse apologies mixed with promises to pay and urging me not to call the insurance agent. I told her to tell him to please knock it off and shut up which she proceeded to do in a spate of rapid fire Spanish.  She had called some friends in the meantime and soon the situation blossomed into an eleven person Puerto Rican festival (with one Anglo) trying to get the car out of the foxhole it had dug for itself.  To me it was quite clear that only a tow truck would do the trick. I told them they should get all the ladies and the baby home first, leave the car there, and call for a tow in the morning.  

My experience with calling for the Cleveland police on holidays in instances where blood was not flowing had been less than satisfactory so I decided against that. I took some pictures as evidence.

The ladies left.  Then the guys fiddled with shovels, boards from the broken fence, the steel posts from the chain link, and after an hour of wasted effort and more dirt sprayed even further agreed to call a truck.  A rusty white Ford Ranger (the lightest pickup Ford makes) showed up shortly with a nylon rope that snapped as soon as the truck was in gear.  Another call this time for a real tow service and another half hour and the Caravan was yanked like an impacted molar from my little garden.  Luis, one of the guy's friends, assured me they would be back later in the day to restore everything and thanked me for being so understanding.  My understanding was that they had all been at the same party and no one should light a cigarette near any of them. 

"Happy New Year," they waved as they drove off.  Happy for you; not so happy for me, I thought in my best Señor Wences imitation.

Love, Peace, and Hope,
James Manista