Sunday, June 12, 2011

This, That

I heard someone offer no good deed goes unpunished--they were talking about one situation on a Saturday morning but I'm thinking of another that happened on Friday afternoon. Around the time I was calling it a day at work and walking towards my car, someone in another car passed me in search of a parking spot.

He found one up ahead, signaled and made the turn into the spot all in one motion. Game over. I continued to walk towards my car which took me past his. The driver was just getting out as I walked by. My Imp of the Perverse having ignored most of the world's seven billion or so other fellow travelers Friday (but check for yourself now) decided social intercourse and human interaction was just the ticket and lurched into action.

My ears heard my mouth offer in an extremely cheerful voice (I hate when I do that bonhomie 'hail fellow! well met!' crap) 'just so you know, your driver's side brake light is out' which, as a conversational opening gambit, falls rather squarely in the innocuous bordering on moronic scale of exchanges. The driver, now standing beside his own vehicle looking at me evenly, noted in a flat tone of voice. "what's your fluckin' point" (but without the L).

I've collected good questions much of my life. I started out trying to pair each of them with good answers but that rapidly became a bridge too far so questions it is. And his was a fine one for any day in the week but especially for a Friday that had seen me blow up a cell phone and not yet discover if telephone, television or connectivity had been restored at our home or if we were fated to spend a weekend in the Amish Relocation Program.

All I could do was smile-no words could adequately explain to the driver that I had only attempted to be helpful, but no worries (as the kids say), SB, it won't happen again. Ever. As for that good deed, hardly a trace left in the here and now, just junk all across the horizon-a real highwayman's farewell.
-bill kenny

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