But then again: WEEKENDER Column

WEEKENDER Column:

Just another drive up the spine of the Back Mountain on the Memorial Highway. Then, out of the blue, twin flashes of blinding light.

Fireworks? It was really bright. Like arc welding, avert your eyes, bright. It was in two spots simultaneously. Seemed like it was a pyrotechnic display. But then I saw wires whipping around and tree branches falling on passing cars. Something bad electrical had happened. It raised the hair on back of my neck. We have very little idea about the power passes over our heads. All the time.

You don’t stop or slow on the Memorial Highway unless you want to become a stain on the road surface. So my glimpse of the aftermath was just that, a glimpse.

I tried to do the right thing. On my tombstone it will say: “No Good Deed Goes Unpunished.”
“911 whatisyouremergancy?”
“Something happened to the power lines on the Memorial Highway between Sheets and the animal hospital. Explosions.”
“Your name?”
I told him, wondering why.
“Cell phone?”
Now I was concerned. So far most of the conversation had not been about the emergency. Did he need to know my name? AND 911 DOESN’T HAVE CALLER ID? I live in Lehman Township. We barely have roads and we have it. But I told him.
“Where?”
“Southbound on the Memorial Highway near Sheets.”
“Town?’
“Town? I dunno. Shavertown. Dallas maybe.”
“Address?”
“Address? I dunno. Between the Sheets and the animal hospital.”
If you are keeping score that was the THIRD time I told him where .
“Which Sheets?”
“There is only one here.”
“Power lines are in the road?”
Now to be fair: 911 guys work long hours. They are underpaid. They get loads of prank calls.
But, I had been on the phone for a while and now we were just getting to what happened and he had it wrong.
“No, I didn’t say that. I don’t know because I am long past there now. I know there was debris in the road.”
“Debris?”
My instinct was to go all “Airplane” on the guy. Debris, yeah, you know: rubble, wreckage, ruins, litter and discarded garbage/refuse/trash, scattered remains of something destroyed. I didn’t.
“Yeah, tree branches maybe.”
“I’ll alert them.” Click.

The paper said the next day that a tree fell on some power lines in the Back Mountain. Not sure if that was my incident or not. I’ll probably never know.

The Rant D’Jour is about word usage in a fowl manner.

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised at anything anymore. I guess my shock-o-meter by this time of my life should be pretty well…Rant D’Jour