Friday, September 22, 2006

I Tried

Today Anna was off. We went out to do various things. One of the things on our list was for her to get a permanent.

I let her out at the beauty shop she goes to in Smyrna and then drove to a nearby ATM machine in a lower income area. The ATM machine is in the middle of a empty parking lot of a declining shopping center, so I wasn’t worried about getting mugged while there or anything like that..

I got the money we needed and I left the shopping Center on Pat Mell Road. Pat Mell Road separates Marietta and Smyrna.

I rode down the Pat Mell Road looking at old houses and stores I remembered from another time and how they have weathered. I came upon another main road and got in a lane to turn right to go back to the beauty shop.

I almost hit an old man sitting on the curb. He was a man with handsome stock of white hair. He had a nice looking purple long-sleeve button up shirt. The only reason I mention the shirt that that any one wearing a shirt with buttons in that neighborhood looks like he doesn’t belong.

I turned and two blocks down I felt guilty. Something was wrong with that man, so I looked for another street that I could loop back up where I almost ran over his feet and pull into the convenience store behind him and ask if he was OK.

I did the looping but he wasn’t there. I was sitting at the red light in the right hand turn only lane again and I saw him. He was across the busy main street trying to cross the other corner and he fell down. He stood up and this time began hopping like he was in a potato sack race, hopping with both legs uniformly springing. He looked nuts.

He made it to the other side, and in front of a Waffle House was a little strip of green grass between the street and the parking lot. He fell into the grass and his face was aimed upward.

That old man needed help. Again, I made the same loop around and this time stayed out of the right-turn only lane and got in the lane to go straight. I saw him in his purple shirt getting up on his knees.

Then a truck that worked itself out into the traffic from the convenience store blocked my view for a few seconds…. Not more than 15 seconds. The light turned and the trucked lined up and I shot across the busy intersection. The man was not anywhere to be seen.

He either went into the Waffle House or somebody put him in a car.

Either way, I hope he got help.

9 comments:

kenju said...

That was weird, Eddie. I think I might have called 911 on my cell phone about/for him.

Eddie said...

Judy,
I had my cell phone out and had planned to call 911, but I wanted to talk to him first.

Unknown said...

do you think he'd been drinking? reminds me of one time when i was in new orleans, we were just driving down the road and saw an older looking man fall in a bank parking lot...we pulled in and checked on him, had him call his son from our cell phone. i hope if ever i experience anything like that, somebody will help me.

Eddie said...

Bird,
I think his mind and body was going through some kind of stress... either stroke, heart-attack, cracking up, somebody crammed some kind of drug in his sytem.... afterall, he was hopping.

Eddie said...

Bird,
I think his mind and body was going through some kind of stress... either stroke, heart-attack, cracking up, somebody crammed some kind of drug in his sytem.... afterall, he was hopping.

Suzanne said...

Oh my. I am glad that you weent back to try and help. That was very kind of you.

Anonymous said...

Bird and i were once on the way to Mississippi and we saw a motorcylcist who was down by the side of the road. We didnt stop. Later an ambulance passed us going by where he was. Neither of us have ever forgotten it.

Eddie said...

Suzanne,
Was I kind or did I realize the old man would be easy to roll?
Joking.

Eddie said...

Steve,
One time we were driving through West Virginia going to Gettysburg, Pa., on a state highway, and we went around a corner and the pickup truck that has just passed us was nose up in a field and people were running towards it. That was a time I regretted not getting out to help... but I excuse myself saying at least two people were running over... but what if they needed three to drag the passengers out?