(The year is 1981. AT&T is still an intact phone monopoly and I am in college. For calling home, I use a card to assign the billing to my parents’ phone. In the middle of the day, I need to call my parents for just a minute for some vital information. I pick up the phone, hear the dial tone and push 0. Nothing happens. I push it again and get what I expect. I continue dialing the number. The phone rings and is answered:)
Caller: *sleepy voice in what seems to be a British accent* “‘ello?”
Me: “Oh! Sorry! I think I have a wrong number.”
Caller: “No worries, mate.”
(I hung up quite bewildered. I know my own home phone number. I try the whole process all over and get ahold of my mom. Jump ahead a month to yet another call home.)
Me: “Hi, dad!”
Dad: “What is this with a $10 charge for a call to Sydney, Australia?”
Me: “Uh-oh!”
(I love ghost stories and have seen and experienced them myself. I am talking to a friend who is of a particular cult church. I haven’t told her that I believe in them. She’s just told me that in her mission visits she met a lady who believed in ghosts.)
Me: “So you don’t believe in ghosts?”
Friend: “No, believing in ghosts is evil. Anyone who believes is corrupted and will never get to heaven or be forgiven by God.”
Me: “Okay, so what does [Church] believe happens to us when we die?”
Friend: “We just lie in our coffins until judgment day and on judgment day we rise and then it’s decided whether we go to heaven or hell.”
Me: “How boring would that be. I’d at least like to spend the time haunting someone.”
(Back in high school I was on a college prep track, so I was very busy, but I made time to volunteer at a local soup kitchen. This is from a conversation with a fellow volunteer. We are on the topic of honoring our parents.)
Volunteer: “Do you help your mother around the house?”
Me: “I certainly try to, but I don’t get done with homework until late. By the time I can help out, there’s not much to do.”
Volunteer: “You should help your mom with more around the house. It’s important to do what your mom wants.”
Me: “I agree. That’s why I prioritize my homework. My mom wants me to go to college, and she understands that that means I’m too busy to help with chores. If I chose doing chores over my homework, I wouldn’t pass my classes, which would disrespect all the hard work she does.”
Volunteer: “You should surprise your mom by doing chores!”
(I gave up.)
We joke about people who drive large trucks in East Texas, and my husband always has tons of stories to share. His favorite is still about some guy in a Dodge double cab trying to weave in and out of traffic. He decided to ride my husband’s rear for a good five miles, then nearly caused an accident when he darted to the left lane, then in front of my husband. He slammed on his brakes, trying to cause my husband to hit him, but my husband had already begun to stop. He just had a feeling the guy was road-raging.
The truck driver decided to speed back up and gets stuck behind someone going extremely slow, and is unable to move back over due to the right lane’s decrease of speed. My husband, however, is able to get over due to having a small car. He watches with interest as the truck speeds up, slams on his brakes, then speeds up again in repetition while getting nowhere. My husband eventually is back beside him and sees the guy slamming his hands on his wheel, cursing at traffic.
They get to a stop light, and it has turned red by the time the truck has gotten to it. All the same, he speeds through it, catching up to my husband … who has slowed down at the next red light. In succession, they caught every red light for five more stops. At the final red light, the truck driver looks as though he’s going livid. He looks over at my husband, who merely grins at him, waves, and then turns left off the main road.
(As I live in a busy city, albeit in a nice area, I am a little protective of my bike. I bring it into my apartment at night and never leave it tied up outside for long. As a joke my dad recently attached a particularly ugly children’s cartoon horn to the bike and finding it amusing I haven’t bothered taking it off. One day I park my bike in bad spot at the mall and come out to see a man bent over it. Obviously, I assume he is trying to damage it or steal it so I walk around to stand in front of him.)
Me: “Excuse me. Can my bike and I help you?”
(He looks up at me horrified and I realize he has a screwdriver in his hand with the horn dangling from a screw.)
Me: “Are you seriously stealing my bike horn?”
(He then drops the screwdriver and runs away.)
Me: “Wait, it’s ugly; you can have it! Oh, well, too late. Hey, free screwdriver!”
(Needless to say, I am even more cautious about my bike in the city now. I dropped the horn in a donation bin a few days later, though. It was nice of him to take it off. And I still have his screwdriver.)
