Saturday, January 14, 2012

A Fact of Life

The other day when Peggy headed out on her bike for her afternoon swim, she was met with a ton of traffic including several large buses coming down a normally quiet side street. When she made it to the main drag,  she found her friend Lynn standing in the street with policemen next to her crunched car.  A scooter had ploughed into Lynn as she pulled out onto the boulevard. The accident was her fault. No one was hurt, other than their pride.

Lynn called out to Peggy asking her to go get Javier, husband of Laura.  By the time Javier got to the scene a few minutes later, Lynn and the car were already gone.  Taxi drivers standing nearby said they had been taken to the police station.  At the police station, Javier did what he does so well!  Over the course of a few hours, he had made good friends with the cops by schmoozing, buying them cokes and joking.  All the while, he made sure that necessary documents (car title, registration, divers license, insurance, etc.) were brought to the police station.

On the “outside”, our friend Dick brought his neighbor, George, to the station as a reinforcement.  George knows everyone on the island.  He glad-handed seemingly all who worked at the station.

The ending was a happy one.  Lynn didn’t have to spend the night in jail wearing her bathing suit, George was able to take time out from sweeping his sidewalk to see old friends, Laura had the money to pay the fine and bribe that Javier negotiated, and Javier got to eat a Snickers bar that was meant to soothe Lynn’s nerves.  As a body builder, Javier just doesn’t do Snickers bars!  The best part is that Lynn realized just how many friends she has here (not enough space here to list all who helped in one way or another ) AND, yes, her car is wounded but drivable. 

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