About two weeks ago my neighbor’s car met with a disaster. Poor little Echo; it never saw it coming.
It happened in the midst of a raging windstorm. And when I say raging, I mean that I actually took the vacuum cleaner out of the tiny hall closet and put some pillows, a blanket, my tennis shoes and my cell phone in there – just in case. I even wore my best nightie lest rescue was required by some hunky firefighters after my roof collapsed…sorry, what was I saying? Oh yes. I had brought our large, black, wheeled, city issued trashcans up against the duplex for safekeeping; mine had already been blown over twice, so I just left it. This way it would not blow over again in the middle of the night and scare the bejezus out of me like it usually does. The winds were blowing at a sustained 60mph, gusting up to 95. I went to bed and had just started drifting off to sleep; it was 10:45pm. Suddenly a large crash woke me up; it sounded like my neighbor had run over one of the large trashcans. Bummer, I thought, not terribly concerned. But then as I stared to be more awake, I remembered that the trashcans were up against the duplex; there was no way the neighbor could have run over one of them. Their SUV was already in the driveway, but his wife usually parked their little Echo car in the driveway behind it. Then I had the odd feeling of remembering the sound of glass breaking. And I realized that there were headlights shining in my bedroom window (which faces the street). Things just seemed odd to me so I got out of bed and tiptoed into the living room and peeked through the vertical blinds looking into the front yard. I could see what appeared to be a vehicle blocking our driveway, still running with the offending headlights shining in my bedroom window. I didn’t have my contacts in so I was blind as a bat and without the benefit of sonar. It seemed like there were people, or at least a person, walking back and forth, in and out of the driveway. Eventually I heard voices but couldn’t make out what they were saying. I wasn’t sure what was going on, but when I heard my neighbor say, “Are you sure you’re OK?” I thought – something is seriously going on. I ran and got my jeans on, threw on a shirt and a pair of flip-flops and ran out the front door to get the scoop.
It turns out that my neighbor’s wife did not park the Echo in the driveway behind the SUV, she had parked it on the curb on their side of the duplex. A large, old pickup truck, sturdily built and with a monster grill guard on it had plowed into the back of it, sending it down the street about 35 feet, up onto the sidewalk wiping out the mailboxes. It was hard to see in the dark, but I got a pretty good idea of the carnage. It was a good thing that the neighbor’s wife and their young daughter were not actually in the car (everyone was in the house and turning in for the night when this happened), because as you can see from the pictures there ain’t a whole lot left of the little Echo. I took these pictures with my cell phone the next morning as I was going to work.
I got the impression that the driver of the pickup was not intoxicated, and seemed to be very cooperative with my neighbor and the police officers that showed up about five minutes later. I haven’t gotten to discuss the whole story with the neighbors as our schedules are quite out of sync and I rarely see them in person. Our mailboxes were finally replaced about a week later, but the old smashed ones were still in my yard this morning; but they were gone when I got home from work today.
Poor little Echo.
It happened in the midst of a raging windstorm. And when I say raging, I mean that I actually took the vacuum cleaner out of the tiny hall closet and put some pillows, a blanket, my tennis shoes and my cell phone in there – just in case. I even wore my best nightie lest rescue was required by some hunky firefighters after my roof collapsed…sorry, what was I saying? Oh yes. I had brought our large, black, wheeled, city issued trashcans up against the duplex for safekeeping; mine had already been blown over twice, so I just left it. This way it would not blow over again in the middle of the night and scare the bejezus out of me like it usually does. The winds were blowing at a sustained 60mph, gusting up to 95. I went to bed and had just started drifting off to sleep; it was 10:45pm. Suddenly a large crash woke me up; it sounded like my neighbor had run over one of the large trashcans. Bummer, I thought, not terribly concerned. But then as I stared to be more awake, I remembered that the trashcans were up against the duplex; there was no way the neighbor could have run over one of them. Their SUV was already in the driveway, but his wife usually parked their little Echo car in the driveway behind it. Then I had the odd feeling of remembering the sound of glass breaking. And I realized that there were headlights shining in my bedroom window (which faces the street). Things just seemed odd to me so I got out of bed and tiptoed into the living room and peeked through the vertical blinds looking into the front yard. I could see what appeared to be a vehicle blocking our driveway, still running with the offending headlights shining in my bedroom window. I didn’t have my contacts in so I was blind as a bat and without the benefit of sonar. It seemed like there were people, or at least a person, walking back and forth, in and out of the driveway. Eventually I heard voices but couldn’t make out what they were saying. I wasn’t sure what was going on, but when I heard my neighbor say, “Are you sure you’re OK?” I thought – something is seriously going on. I ran and got my jeans on, threw on a shirt and a pair of flip-flops and ran out the front door to get the scoop.
It turns out that my neighbor’s wife did not park the Echo in the driveway behind the SUV, she had parked it on the curb on their side of the duplex. A large, old pickup truck, sturdily built and with a monster grill guard on it had plowed into the back of it, sending it down the street about 35 feet, up onto the sidewalk wiping out the mailboxes. It was hard to see in the dark, but I got a pretty good idea of the carnage. It was a good thing that the neighbor’s wife and their young daughter were not actually in the car (everyone was in the house and turning in for the night when this happened), because as you can see from the pictures there ain’t a whole lot left of the little Echo. I took these pictures with my cell phone the next morning as I was going to work.
I got the impression that the driver of the pickup was not intoxicated, and seemed to be very cooperative with my neighbor and the police officers that showed up about five minutes later. I haven’t gotten to discuss the whole story with the neighbors as our schedules are quite out of sync and I rarely see them in person. Our mailboxes were finally replaced about a week later, but the old smashed ones were still in my yard this morning; but they were gone when I got home from work today.
Poor little Echo.
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