Small world story #552
Howard, on host 209.255.8.84
Monday, September 9, 2002, at 09:28:56
If you like small world stories, here's . . . well, another one. We went down into Rutherford county over the weekend to visit assorted Elderly Relatives and friends. Doing that always makes us feel younger. One ER, my wife's aunt, was celebrating her 92nd birthday and everybody who was even slightly related showed up. She lives in a nursing home and is slightly deaf, but her eyes and mind are as sharp as ever. She can identify a great, great, grand child from 50 feet away in about a second.
Anyway to make a long story slightly less long, my cousin-in-law, also named Howard, introduced me to his son-in-law, Wayne. Howard told Wayne that I was a Cushman motorscooter collector, and he commented that he almost got killed on one of those. (Not the first time that I've heard that.) He said he hit a truck.
A light came on in my head, so I asked him if he ever worked for the Daily News Journal. Now that threw him a little. How did I know that he used to deliver that paper? So he said that he did. And I said that he hit the left door of the truck because the driver turned without giving a signal, just as he was passing it. By this time, I really had his attention. The accident happened 45 years ago, but you don't forget a thing like that. I can still see his head missing the rear view mirror on that truck by inches. The memory of that scooter spinning around on it's tail light and tumbling across the intersection with the rider rolling alongside was pretty well burned into my memory. I was sure he was dead.
I had to explain to him that I was in the car right behind him when it happened and that I was among the first to find out that he had survived with only cuts and bruises. After a while, he said that he could remember me from the time when we both worked at the Daily News Journal and he even remembered my wife, who also worked there. I sat and talked to Wayne about an hour and I have to admit that it was a very enjoyable birthday party. I'm sure glad Wayne wasn't dead. Howard
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