Bedtime Stories

I guess there's something about driving a hearse around that screams, "Talk to me! Tell me about your dead loved ones!" I'm hoping this is a fluke, since I never know what to say to people when they dwell on the dead, even if they're good friends.

I was getting gas in Ashland, Oregon. Rather, an attendant was filling my gas tank for me, since you can't do it yourself there. He was an old hippie... pleasant.

When I finished using the bathroom, I was nearly accosted by some lady who had seen my car from down the street. She had been talking to the attendant and apparently I was her next victim.

"Aaagghhh! I nearly had a heart attack!" she exclaimed. "I thought the ladies up the street at the Coffee Bean were playing a joke on me with this big car here."

"No, it's not a joke," I said, vainly attempting to sound cheerful. It was pouring rain and windy, the bad weather in the mountains had seriously screwed me up timewise, and I was in desperate need of coffee.

"Well I thought it was joke! Those ladies have a crazy sense of humor!"

"No, ma'am. It's not a joke. This is really my car, and I really use it to transport myself and my possessions from one place to another."

"Let me tell you, I've know a LOT of people who have been in one of these," she said. "Toooo many people."

I didn't quite understand what was so special about that, unless she was trying to tell me she had friends in the funeral business. So I said, "Alive or dead?"

She indignantly replied, "Well they weren't alive! No indeed, they definitely weren't!"

"Well, everyone dies. Have a good night."

Sorry, lady. Try spending six hours alternating between crawling up steep inclines in the far right lane sandwiched between semi trucks because your car doesn't have any pickup and riding your breaks down curvy roads, hoping you don't spin out or hydroplane into some jackass in a sports car. The only death that concerns me right now is mine.