Prayer for Judgement

I got pulled over last week for running a stop sign in my neighborhood, where a police officer had been sitting all week, waiting for someone to run that stop sign. Since I knew he was there, I didn’t run the stop sign. Also, I don’t run stop signs. He said I did. I said I didn’t. We disagreed.

He didn’t give me a ticket, but perhaps I was due for one. My driving record is a string of close calls and lucky breaks, with a few unlucky breaks in between. I would say I’m a good driver, but history states otherwise.

My first car was a Toyota Paseo, and it was fast. I wasn’t fast, the car was. And it was a stick shift. Did you know that you can skip gears for quicker acceleration with a manual transmission? Just saying.

My first wreck occurred when I was reaching down to get a marshmallow from the bag wedged between the gear shift and dashboard. A normal-sized marshmallow, for breakfast, on the way to school.

The Paseo went under a Rodeo, a collision of Spanish names, plastic, and metal. My front end was ruined, but everyone was safe. My dear, blessed, foolish parents fixed the car and let me drive it again.

Strangest thing is, I could’ve sworn I pressed the gas in panic instead of the brakes.

From there, it gets no better, though for the record, no one was ever hurt.

I once hit a tree in my mother’s front yard, where I’d lived most of my life. A fifty year old, highly visible tree. I couldn’t count the number of traffic cones I’ve taken out of commission.

How many vehicles have I hit? 6, at least

How many have hit me? 2

Don’t say it.

And the tickets…

Speeding & strange maneuvers? 3 to 5.

But there were plenty of times I got out of it.

Like when I was driving up the Carolina Beach bridge post-yard saling one Saturday morning and got pulled for going too fast. And my drivers license was expired. And my car insurance. I argued with the officer that he was wrong; no way those were expired. And my old truck couldn’t possibly be speeding up a bridge. Yet he was correct on all accounts.

So, I renewed my license and insurance, and went to court.

My hair dresser was there, and I waved as the judge had us all choose whether we were pleading guilty, not guilty….

“Love my hair,” I whispered to the stylist, fanning it with my hand and missing the last two options.

Well darn. A friend had suggested a prayer for judgement (when you promise not to do it again or pay double next time), and I wanted one of those. I figured I’d wait until I could ask the judge.

I sat until the end of traffic court, when the judge called those still remaining to the front. There were two other bad drivers, with their lawyers. He spoke to them then came to me.

“Where’s your lawyer?”

“I don’t have one.”

“What’s your plea?”

“I want a prayer for judgement, please.”

“And you don’t have a lawyer?”

“No, sir.”

“You need a lawyer for that.”

“Oh. I didn’t know. Sorry.”

Sigh. “Hey, Jim.” He called over one of the attorneys hanging around the courtroom. “How about doing some pro bono work?”

With a few scrawls on paper and a court fee, the case was dismissed. Highlight of my driving career.

The lowlight was the time I became the bologna in a van sandwich, and the folks that hit me didn’t have insurance. And I didn’t have the kind that fixed me or my truck. Twenty years later, I still have a crick in the left side of my neck.

Or when I hit that poor guy.

I was pulling out of a beach parking lot, going all of three miles an hour, and…I don’t know…gray day, gray truck, sun glare, a one and three year old in the back seat, sleep deprivation…I rolled right into his drivers side door. Only my snail speed kept anyone from being injured.

The now-seven-year-old still talks about the day mom hit someone.

Which is why I shouldn’t judge the wreck I saw a few days ago.

It was school pick-up time, and I was pulling into the car line when I noticed the smoke.

Something was on fire in the bus parking lot. The pick-up line was moving even slower than usual, and within seconds, sirens were approaching, causing a cluster of mom vans, fire trucks, and school buses.

I parked and got the kids. Black plastic-smelling smoke swirled while parents, teachers, and children covered their noses with their shirts. By the time I walked the boys by the fire, it was out. A fireman was pointed his hose at some sort of blackened moped stuck in a fence, squirting it one more time for good measure.

My mom met us at the park across from the school. She had the scoop.

A ten year old had lost control of his gas-powered scooter, and rather than run into a car, bus, or Kindergartner, he jackknifed the fence. Right beside the huge propane tank for the school boiler. He says the throttle stuck, not his fault. No one was hurt. His parents are going to buy him another one.

At first, I was like:

He shouldn’t be driving a gas scooter.

He shouldn’t have been going so fast.

He shouldn’t have been near the primary school.

He’s a bad driver.

Don’t let him drive again.

And then I remembered my own record and gave him a prayer for judgement.

• – by Jessi Waugh