Unexpected hiccup
After Thomas’ bus comes to pick him up, I drive over to a friend’s house to help put her son on his bus before I head to my school for work. Since I work at K-1 Mattie Washburn, I have to time everything so that I can A) avoid traffic, B) find parking, and C) arrive in time to sign in and get my things put away before it’s time to retrieve my students off of their busses. That means that for the first couple of weeks, I drive to Mattie as soon as Thomas gets picked up, park, and walk the couple of blocks to Andrew’s house, or I risk having A), B), and C) go south.
On the first Friday of school I parked in the far back lot, by the baseball diamond, and merrily went on my day. Andrew on the bus – check! Sign in to school – check! Kiddos off the bus – check! School – check! Head home for a much-desired nap – uh, oh. Why is there glass in the parking space next to my car? What is that lacy thing on my window? Wait, where is most of my window?
Someone had vandalized my car during the school day. My driver’s side window was shattered into little nuggets of glass, all over my seat, floor and parking space.
When you come upon something like this there’s a beat where you see what is there, but it takes your brain a second to comprehend what is there. And then once you do realize what it is, your brain kind of stutters in a what-do-I-do? moment. Do I call AAA? Do I knock the glass out and drive home? I called Matt.
What we ended up doing was this: I called Megan, who was at home, and had her bring my wallet (which had inadvertently gotten left at home after reconciling the checkbook online that morning – oops!), some gloves, a trash container, broom and dustpan. I also had her call the non-emergency police line to have an officer come out and make a report. Megan arrived in minutes, and moments later, so did the Windsor police officer.
officer couldn’t have been nicer. He said how sorry he was to see that this had happened, and then he asked (apologetically) if I had any enemies or people who wished me harm (no) and then he began his report.
I should point out that nothing was stolen – there wasn’t anything in the car to tempt someone to break in. This was simply a malicious act of vandalism, pure and simple.
It turns out that there have been a spate of this sort of thing happening in that neighborhood recently, all similar in that they seem to be more about doing the damage than about taking anything of value out of the vehicle. The perpetrator hasn’t been caught, but there’s a very good chance the police will find whoever it is – especially if he or she is doing it during broad daylight, facing a street, as my car was.
After Officer Bone left, Megan and I cleared up as much glass as we could. (I was worried about the parents’ cars driving on the glass, or the kids getting into it.) I put the big, heavy picnic blanket from my trunk over the seat and drove home gingerly, where we used the shop vac to get even more glass up.
Matt had already called AAA and set up a glass repair guy to come out – a week later was the soonest he could come – and the next morning he taped a piece of clear plastic tarp over the gaping hole, fixing it enough that I could drive to and from work for the few days I would need to do so.
In a situation like this I automatically catalog the blessings: One, no one was hurt. Two, nothing important or special was taken. Three, we have insurance. Four, Megan was home to help out. Five, I had nowhere truly important to be immediately after school, despite the deeply-desired nap. This was an inconvenient hiccup to our lives, but it was not a horrible disaster.
Juliana LeRoy wears many hats, including wife, mother, paraeducator and writer. She can be spotted around Windsor gathering material, or reached at [email protected].
