About Scenery And Mailboxes

During the time I owned my antiques business, we purchased a 2000 Ford Excursion, which is really a Ford 250 pickup with a roof. It was HUGE and was a great boon to me as I hauled things around in my business. When we moved to the upstate of South Carolina in 2007, I continued my business for about another year, and but as I became ill with Myalgic Encephlamyalitis, the antique business had to be sold. We kept the Excursion though, because it came in handy for hauling bales of pine straw,

 flats of flowers, dogs, or anything else that needed something big for transportation.

I had had a few minor mishaps with the Excursion when we first got it, because it is such a large vehicle to try and mix it up with smaller cars in a normal sized parking lot. The top of the Excursion's tires come up to the top of the hood on small sedans. I am thankful that it was never anything serious, and I finally managed to feel like I had mastered the art of driving it and felt pretty comfortable doing so. But if you aren't careful, it can catch you off guard in just a moment!

The roads in the area where we live now are almost all country roads, narrow with little to no shoulder. One day soon after we had moved up here, I was leaving the drive-in window of our local drug store, I noticed a road going off around a couple of small mountains. I knew from the name of the road, it must come out near where I would have taken my turn off towards home on my usual route. So I decided to take the long way home, and see what I could see on this unfamiliar road.

As most country roads around here, it had a lot of attractive scenery - old houses, old trees, yards with flowers, farms with cows and horses. And it also had sharp curves and S turns where you had to be careful you did not run off the road into perhaps an old stone wall. So I was moving along, enjoying the scenery, and trying to be careful to give enough room for occasional oncoming traffic. Then I came around one curve in the midst of a stand of trees, to suddenly having an open field to my left, where the distant mountains could be seen over graceful trees in a green pasture. What a lovely view, I thought, as the road kept curving. Then I was jerked back to reality by the sound of

WHAM!!!

As I quickly turned my head to the right, I caught the sight of a green plastic mailbox bouncing up against the bank, and my outside rear view mirror ripped from the side of the car. I quickly eased the car to the side of the road, and sat there for a minute, stunned by the loud noise, and the now useless hanging mirror. I glanced back at the mailbox, and knew that I couldn't just drive off, so I found a place to turn around and then parked in the driveway by the damages. I got out to try and hopefully put it back together, but it wasn't going to happen. Looking down at the pieces, I felt so stupid and then, taking a big sigh I climbed back into my car and drove up the steep driveway to let the owners know that I would purchase them a brand new mailbox. After knocking on the door several times I realized that the person wasn't home, so I found some scrap paper, wrote them a message and taped it to the glass door so they'd see it. Then I drove on home, keeping my eyes squarely in the road.

When I returned home and filled in my husband with my sad story, all I could do was wait now until the person called me. John very kindly offered to take me out for a quick bite since he could tell I was still rattled by the incident. When we returned, there was a message on our house phone from an elderly man with a southern twang:

"Miss Cook? This is Daniel __________. You lef' me a message about my mail box? Well, honey, jus' don't worry yourself 'bout that mailbox, it's been hit so many times I might as well jus' throw it away. I have a home health nurse, she's an ex drug addict, ya know, and she can just' take care of it. I 'preciate your leaving me the message and all, but jus' put it out of your head, 'cause there ain't no reason to worry about it no more!"

John and I just looked at each other, then I played it back again. The second time, I started laughing and yes, I did feel better. When I took the car in for repairs, however, it wasn't a laughing matter, as the repairs cost well over $300. But at least I didn't have to buy a new mailbox! 

Live your life one day at a time!