Death Defying Shopping Trip for Knitting Needles

Friday the 13th, any other time one just thinks of the “bad luck” day and snicker a little. Last Friday was one of those I remember thinking “don’t break a mirror, watch out for black cats and don’t walk under any ladders” then chuckled and went on with my day.

I’ll admit to being a little stressed about work lately, my job security is only as good as the length of my current funding which runs out in June. I have had to step slowly away from watching all the doom and gloom in the news reports about the economy. I have not opened any of my retirement account statements in the last 6 months, what’s the point, really? I have a mortgage with one of the WORST mortgage companies…Chase. Chase deserves it’s own post on this blog which will come at a later time…stay tuned, but I suspect if any of you have a mortgage with that lender you’ll know ahead of time what I’m going to say and if you don’t have a loan with them and considering a refi on your home, unless you are a Congressman or Senator…stay clear of them……….but I digress.

Last Friday, I went through my day like any other Friday. In the afternoon I decided I wanted to start a project for my hairdresser. I thought the Just Enough Ruffles Scarf would be a great scarf for her and since I have an appointment in a little over a week I’d have a good chance of having it done by then. The problem I encountered is that this scarf really does require a longer cable needle in the size that I was using. No big deal and it didn’t seem to be a problem because I could run up to the LYS after I picked up Jillian from her school. She gets out at 5 and I’d have an hour to get her and to run to the store. Well, here is how that went down and how I nearly died or at a minimum cause a big mess…….

4:45pm texted Jillian telling her I was in the parking lot. (Sometimes she gets out a little early on Fridays)

Texted conversation between Jillian and me:

Jillian: “Great, I will be right out because I have to meet Megan at 5”.

Me: “Well I need to swing by the LYS to get needles”.

Jillian: some version of teenage pig Latin with symbols and abbreviations was texted back….I got the thrust of the message as having attitude because she was in a rush.

I decided to just sit in the car and grow irritated.

Jillian gets out to the car we load up her supplies and we get on our way. Jillian having time to think about my “quick trip” to the LYS was fine with it but warned that it really did need to be quick because she knows me only too well. A “quick trip” to the LYS for needles could end up lasting hours looking through books, patterns, feeling up yarn skeins…….in other words, she knows me. But I reassured her that the store would close soon so I could ONLY have a quick trip.

After an IN/OUT trip with needles in hand I jump in the car. Jillian smiling saying “I’m proud of you mom, that was a record!” Shared a giggle over that and we were on our way in time for her to meet Megan who we found out was running late.

First traffic light we hit was red but about to turn green. There was a car first, then a truck, I am behind the truck and then a long line of cars right behind me lined up waiting for the green light. The light turned green and the first car went through the intersection. The truck starts to move on and I follow……only the truck stopped short right at the light…I hit the brake hard and stop just short and the car behind me slams on his breaks. The light is green….no one is moving. I’m really getting irritated because it appears that the jackass in the truck is looking at instructions….is he turning left or right….does he go straight through….? Well the light turned red while he was deciding. I’m steaming the guy behind me was even worse and I am glad I couldn’t read his lips from the rear view mirror cause I’m sure it wasn’t nice.

Cross traffic now has the green light and they are speeding through the intersection……I thought that every driver was looking smugly at us as they whizzed by. Jillian and I start discussing her plans for the evening and having a light conversation.

All of a sudden we heard a loud bell ringing and THAT is when I realized that I was straddling the Trolley Tracks!! I look at the light and it is still red, the car behind me was too close so I couldn’t back up. I see the gates starting to come down and I’m starting to feel my heart rate jolt and the pounding of my heart up into my throat. I vaguely remember Jillian yelling, “MOM, GO!” and I yelled “WHERE”. I am frantically looking side to side to see if I could see the Trolley coming, then I saw it was coming from the right side.

All of a sudden the light turned green and the truck took off….but the gate is now smashing down on the top of my car and banging loudly. I look to the right and see the driver of the Trolley and his mouth was wide open as if he was yelling …..screaming to get out of the way.

In the car behind me….I see in the rear view mirror the panic in the guys face and he is motioning to the cars behind him to back off. He manages to back up a little bit.

I hear Jillian yell “MOMMY!” just as I’m able to back up a little bit off the tracks. The gate was bouncing down the windshield and resting on the hood of the engine JUST AS THE TROLLEY breezed by.

I looked over at Jillian, Jillian is looking at me just before we both bursted into tears. We both are covered in Flop Sweat (flop sweat = profusely sweating from nervousness when you are caught doing something totally STUPID) We both tried to quickly regain composure and look around us wanting some reassurance that no one we knew saw this spectacle. Once we realized that we were going to live, and that no one from either of our social circles saw this episode we started to calm down a little. For Jillian, meeting Megan didn’t seem quite as important now.

Jillian nearly completely recovered just quietly said “That was so lame.”

Silently we went the rest of the way home.

I came home and immediately went into the bedroom to lay down. I held a couple of balls of Alpaca wool and thought I’d hold off starting any knit projects. I figured my gauge would be way too tight.

While laying down I realized that the last time my darling daughter Jillian, whom I adore, called me “Mommy” was about two years ago when she was passing a Kidney Stone.