Mystery Man

 

I was doing my walk this morning and haven’t even gone far enough to be off my street when a red pickup truck slowed down, then stopped and the window rolled down.  An old fart, about my age, said, “How you doing?”

“So so, how you doing?”  “Who is this guy?”  I thought.

We talked and talked.  We talked about the old days in Marietta and going to the Old Hospital on Cherokee Street, and Doctor Merl Haygood, and more old Marietta stuff.  And all the time wondering “Do I know this old fart?”

We talked about our time in the service, he was in the Army about the same time I was in the Navy. 

I know it is a Small World, but it would be nice if I knew who I was talking to.

He said he thinks I should get another dog.  It seems he knew about Willow’s departure.

I am not sure, but I think it could have been the same guy that between 5 and 10 years ago at the bottom of the hill on the street near by in the morning before daylight I saw the flickering of flames in the back of a house.  That was before I carried a  cell phone, so it must have been nearer ten years or more.  I bangedf on the door of the house and no one came.  About that time a pickup truck slowly rode by and I ran out in the street and waved him down.  He had a cell phone so he 911.

The firetrucks came and what it was flames were surrounding the LP gas bottle and the fittings.  The put the flame out and woke up the woman that lived there then and told her.

Ironically, a week or so later while walking I saw the woman in her yard and I told her that I was the one who called 911 (which really it wasn’t, it was the guy in the truck).  I expected a pleasant “Thank you” for saving her and her daughter’s life, but just got a glare, “Why don’t you mind your own business?”

Anyway, back to the guy in the truck this morning, that might have been the person that called 911, if he had on his mask this morning, like he should have, I could have said,

“Who is that masked man?”