To Unexpected Cash

So I'm driving home from my office tonight. It's past six and I've called my husband several times to say I'm on my way, I'm sorry, I'll be home in 20-10-40-five more minutes I swear. And i pull up to the first light and look down. I'm driving my husband's car, because of the broken collarbone thing (it's a stick and his shoulder now contains metal plates and screws) and I see the gas light is on. Way on. And i have no idea how long you get once the light comes on in this car, where as in my own, I know that I get about five more rides before I really ought to get some gas. And I hate pumping gas. But there's this Sinclair station right near my office, and I really like the station because this very cool black man who drives this giant shiny black truck with neon lights underneath bought this and the car wash across the street and turned them both into these brightly lit beacons of light where there used to be a ratty old closed up fallen down filling station that I would have never even considered pulling into.

So I pulled into the station and there's eight pumps and seven are in use and I maneuver the little stick over into the one empty spot and I start to turn off the engine and I remember that the tank is on the other side in this car. So i pull ahead a few feet and start on a three point turn and just as I start to pull in to my pump, this bitch in a blue something or other pulls into my space stopping about five inches from the front of my car. It took me a moment to sort this out in my brain, as I was reeling a bit from the shock of the stolen gas pump and i had visions of this scene from fried green tomatoes where this young bitch in a sports car swings in front of this older woman to steal her spot and the woman begins repeatedly ramming the young girl's parked car, and I just stared at the girl with this dumbfounded look on my face (i may have mouthed fucking whore, but I'm not certain) and pulled around a jeep wrangler that had just entered the scene and headed for the newly empty spot on the other side of the lot.

Well, I rounded the station squeezing around all the hungry cars and started to pull in to my space when out of nowhere the jeep wrangler (red, like mine was when I was young and cool with my long hair and the top down) screeched (i'm not kidding, screeched) around the corner and landed in front of my pump. I do believe i laughed a short hysterical laugh at that point, and I also believe I made eye contact with the jeep bitch when I said fucking whore again (she smiled) and then I fumed out of the station (literally) and continued my trek through the hill on my way home.

I was driving up Columbia fuming about the whores when I got this sudden flashback to my yoga class earlier, and swore Buddha himself told me to calm the fuck down and to stop carrying the fucking bitches. So I did the full yoga breath that my instructor taught us today and I tried to let it go a little. Then I remembered the station at Kingshighway would be at least in walking distance if I did indeed putter out on the way home.

I made it to the other station just fine, and chose my pump based on the two that were available for the handicapped cars with the pumps on the wrong side, pulled in for my gas and got out to pump. I was feeling a little calmer now and did the credit card thing, turned on the pump, briefly acknowledged the man in the pimp-my-ride who had turned on his car alarm once or twice from inside his car just enough to get my attention (I figure I'm good for maybe three more years of pimp-my-ride appreciation so I'm generally gracious during the occasional flirt these days) Frankly I'd almost forgotten about the whores completely by this time, and I hung up the pump, closed up my tank, hit yes for a receipt, waited, and then walked around the car to my door, opened it, sat down, reached over to pull the door shut and glanced down at a roll of cash lying there on the asphalt under my car door. I believe I heard heavenly music and saw the money actually glow.

Now how often does this happen?

I couldn't believe it at first. I looked around to sort out the situation but couldn't. The only thing I COULD do was pick up the money, scan the gas pumps quickly, confirm that there was nobody looking around for a lost wad of cash, thank my lucky whores and pull out of the station. What the hell? Pimp my ride was long gone and there was nobody else nearby looking a hundred dollars poorer.

So I pulled into traffic and headed home, somewhat stoned from this unexpected highlight of my day.

The rest of bizarro night went like this: I get to the light and call C and say you're not going to believe this. He says: what'd you do run out of gas? This because I'm now an hour and a half later than I'd said I'd be. And I said no, there were these bitches and now I have like a hundred dollars and what would you do? Would you turn it in? And he said no way in hell. Found cash is yours. Now if it was a wallet or something you'd have to turn it in. But found cash lying around is the finders. There is no way anyone you bring that wad of cash to is going to do anything other than put it in their own pocket after you walk away, so that is yours baby. You got some money. Now this SORT of sounded like Buddha, but somehow not so much. Maybe it was the Gold Buddha, that fat and happy one in the chinese restaurants.

Now the strangest part of this entire truth-is-much-stranger-than-fiction tale is this: I got home, told my kids about my strange luck (I left out the fucking whores part) and started playing miniature soccer with them on the back deck. C brought me a Widmer. Now if you're a Widmer fan as we are, you know that we only recently got to start purchasing this fine Portland microbrewed Heifeweizen in St. Louis very recently because of some red tape with A-B's monopoly on the beer distribution in this city. Thankfully the ban on good beer is over, and we can now find Widmer in our favorite pub (O'Connell's) and the fancy grocery stores in town. Now if you drink Widmer, you also know that under every cap there is a prost--German for toast--to something or other--fresh starts, skirt-blowing breezes, drive thru liquor stores. The prosts are each different--we've rarely seen the same one twice--and reading them is fun, like opening fortune cookies, I suppose.

C poured a beer for me and sqeezed in a lemon. Then he brought me the icy cold glass of beer and my bottle cap. It read "A Prost...to Unexpected Cash."