Close Call

After going over the garden this morning, we got a call from Dad saying that we all need to get to the hospital, he was having a very hard time. My truck's battery was dead. OK, so I decided to take Dad's car to the hospital. It was low on gas so I decided to stop at Kroger for a quick fill up on the way.

I got onto I-45 and noticed that traffic was being cut down to one lane. I exited at the Willis exit, just before traffic was at a standstill. Just as I turned into the parking lot at Kroger, a young guy bolted across in front of me and causes me to slam on the brakes. I couldn't go anywhere and just as importantly, they couldn't go anywhere because it blocked the traffic on the feeder road too. So I'm cursing about it and as soon as there was room, I went around him hurriedly getting to the gas pumps to fill up. At that point, I was just concerned about getting to the hospital.

About 45 seconds later, that same kid pulls up into the stall next to me while I'm filling up the car. The only reason I recognized him was the doo-rag on his head. So I'm filling up the car and think, "Great, now I'm gonna have to kick somebody's ass over stupidity! I don't have time for this." The kid gets out of the car with a chrome pistol in the front of his pants, staring at me and patting the handle of the pistol. He turned around and gathered trash out of his car and put it in the trash can right next to me. He didn't say anything and neither did I.

Had this been a normal morning where I wasn't worrying about Dad, I would have met the guy before he got out of the car so I could slam his head with the door as he tried to get out. I think it's a pretty good thing that I wasn't feeling like a badass. It may have prevented me from being another corpse. We exchanged stares but he got into his car and drove away as I finished filling up the car.

It was weird because it could have been a major thing in my life...but 30 minutes later I was talking to Dad's doctor and thinking nothing about it. I spent the rest of the day with Dad and didn't even think about it until I got home. Now I'm glad I wasn't aggressive! I sure would like to see if Kroger has video at their pumps.