"On the twelfth day of CHRISTmas my true love gave to me... the kindness of a stranger."
Today was a full day. It kicked off with bad news as I updated our accounts through Quicken (which I love by the way.) A "new" transaction came up for "Miscellaneous Adjustment" deducting several hundred dollars from our account. This was right before I left to take the little kids to school. So I called the bank on the speaker phone on the way there and long story short they have no record of a check I know absolutely positively deposited in the ATM. It's not an "I think," I KNOW that I KNOW I did. So they can "take a claim on that" and will get back to me within a few weeks and they MIGHT give me a temporary return of the money within 10 days. Really doesn't do much for my mortgage payment that's due Monday... good thing I didn't get to the bank this week on that one!
It just sort of set the whole day in motion, set a pace. I went to see Ethan get his award, and my camera wouldn't work on demand yet again. I had to run to Wal-mart, picked up a few things for Jason (above left) and gift cards for each of the kids to take to birthday parties they attended this evening. Scuttled off to work where there was a pile of miscellaneous messes and such and before I knew it it was time to head back to school to take Victoria's class the birthday cupcakes my dad had made for them. I hopped on the freeway thinking it would be moving ok before 2 pm, and I was wrong. I hustled through traffic and got there just in time. When we were done I had too much time to just wait around so I decided to take the extra cupcakes home.
As I was sitting at a stoplight I suddenly realized I had written the wrong name on the gift card I bought for Ethan to give as a gift. I pulled it out and was fiddling with it and apparently I wasn't focused and had let my foot off the break. I wasn't looking forward and I SLAMMED into the car in front of me. Slammed is a relative term because I didn't actually accelerate but I hit her hard, it was loud, it jarred me and I pushed her car into the truck in front of her.
We all hopped out of our cars. The truck in front had no damage, the little blue car in front of me had no damage in her front. My car was OK, but her back bumper had some definite scratches in it. it was like the outline of my licence plate. "I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry," I just kept saying it. "How could I do this? At CHRISTmas? I'm so sorry."
She wanted to check her trunk, make sure it opened ok. The man from the front wanted to make sure WE were ok. Her trunk opened fine. I told her I thought maybe it would buff out, but I wasn't sure, I would give her my info. She said, "No, it's OK, that's why we have cars." Honestly I have no idea exactly what she meant, I mean clearly she didn't mean we have cars so I could rear end her on the road while she sat peacefully at a red light, but I think she just meant as long as all the people were OK, nothing else mattered. She didn't want my info, I offered my phone number in case she reconsidered, she said no, it was fine and she stood there and hugged me and told me it was all alright, right there in the middle of La Palma.
She was a kind woman when I needed a little kindness, and I hope God will bless her for her grace and mercy... and I pray those scratches will buff out!
Merry CHRISTmas!
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