I have a horrible 2 hour commute to and from work. The morning commute ends with a 10 minute (for me, I’m slow) walk from the parking lot in one complex, across Jericho Turnpike (a six lane highway) and into the complex that houses the salt mine I work at.
There’s something special about Long Island. They have no respect for pedestrians. In fact, I think they have a deep-seated, melting hatred of pedestrians. This is why there are no sidewalks in Jericho.
So, I’m walking out of the Quad, keeping well to my right so that the cars entering the parking lot can see me, when some crazy woman takes the sharp turn entrance at about 20 mph, forcing me into a bramble of bushes. Oh yeah, did I mention it is sleeting/snowing/raining and now I’ve got mud up to my ankles?
Well! I don’t take kindly to this and from the bushes I hurl my half eaten 25 cent pack of salted peanuts at her tail lights, (hey, it’s a better-for-you breakfast than pancakes and sausages), tighten my parka hood around my head and climb out of the bushes and onto the Turnpike.
Jericho Turnpike has a divider in the middle so that the game of hitting pedestrians is more like Frogger than ever. I stop there, waiting for my chance to hippity-hop across the last 3 lanes of traffic when I hear peeping behind me. Only it’s not peeping. Over the roar of traffic I can barely make out words. I turn around.
Crazy lady has gotten out of her car and is hurling abuse at me like so many peanuts. Using choice words like “stupid bitch” and "cunt’ – at least that’s what I hear over the traffic.
I have a choice now: Do I hippity-hop back over to where she is at and punch her in her Anne Ramsey lookalike head or do I ignore her and continue to hippity-hop my ass to work? I choose to be rational and go on to work.
But wait! There’s more!
I get into work and tell a few people my story when a co-worker who came in 2 minutes behind me asks, “Was it a woman in a white Reliant, kind of old with long salt and pepper hair?”
“Yeah!” I answer.
“Well, she drove into our parking lot and tried to leave it in the entrance. She left the door open and got out of the car right there at the front driveway by the sign. Security told her she couldn’t leave her car there, so she started fighting with them.”
So if I get run over by a white Reliant anytime in the future, we’ll know who it was.