SLEEPY HOLLOW: FINAL CHAPTER – SO I’M MINDING MY OWN
BUSINESS WHEN…
I assure you, this is the
final chapter in this saga, but I also have to admit that I set you up just a
bit, as well. I tell you the interesting
places I visit and how the entire trip goes, but I also stress the importance
of being aware of my surroundings, making sure I don’t do stupid shit that
might get me mugged or maced or macheted or molested or murdered. These are all very serious offenses, and I do
my best not to become a corpse on the Sleepy Hollow news (film at eleven).
You must understand: There
are so many awful things that happen simply on account of me being me that I
should expect this kind of random crap to happen to me by now. Lord knows I’m old enough to have learned my
lesson, yet when these synchronicities hit me, I am still utterly
surprised. It’s like Groundhog Day all
over again … and again … and again.
On my solo trip to New
York state, I am careful enough to get my EZ pass mounted to the windshield so
I will not have to stop and open my window at toll booths. I am cautious when I plan a pit stop, making
sure I go to safe public places like Panera and not some half-assed,
semi-closed and completely suspect rest area.
I don’t wander too far from my car in the remote sections of the
cemetery. I only get out of my car at
the scenic overlook when I see humans I know to trust.
I am always aware of my
surroundings. I was, after all, a Girl
Scout.
So, naturally, it turns
out that the most dangerous place I find myself is when I am completely
surrounded by people I know well and trust implicitly. Apparently, I have a giant target painted on
me that only certain people can see – strange people; well, nice enough people,
but slightly freaky just the same.
My regular blog readers
may recall my recent run-in with the Beanpot Man, the guy who told me his and
his brother’s entire life stories, offered to buy me a piece of pizza, then
called my kid “Son” when he arrived to meet me, his mom, at the game. At the time of this rather crazy encounter, I
was standing near the pro shop minding my own damn business when the guy just
started talking to me.
This is how it starts,
always and almost without exception.
Today will be no different.
I decide to meet up with
the team bus at the swanky hotel where they stayed the night before, hoping to
follow them over to the college since I have an semi-idea where the campus is
but no flaming idea where the field is. According
to the satellite image of the place (yes, I actually check that shit out when I’m
traveling so I know where the parking lots are), they don’t even have a field,
but the old high school down the street does.
Good thing I follow the bus (that also doesn’t know where it is going)
because the college has added a turf field since the last time Google Earth was
in the vicinity.
The parking lot slopes
down, slightly at first then sharply, heading right toward the Hudson
River. For a split second (or maybe
about ten minutes, I can’t recall because I think my heart stopped for a bit) I
am reminded of entering downtown Burlington, Vermont, where it seems like the
street will end only once it has tossed your car into Lake Champlain. There are several parking lots, all packed to
maximum capacity, but I find a recently vacated spot about two hundred feet from
the banks of the river that is rushing crazily by. The water here is violent, swift, much more
dangerous than upriver by the Kingsland Point Park where the water was calm and
more like a lake. I see a lower parking
lot entrance so far down the slope and near to the banks of the river that I
cannot see the vehicles. Cars disappear
over the edge, then students come walking up, still dry, so I know they have
made it safely. It is so steep that the
school’s shuttle bus starts down the small road then quickly backs up again.
I remain in my car and open
up my cooler to eat the lunch I’ve packed, a turkey sub I made to avoid
stopping anywhere by myself, and enjoy my safe view of the Hudson from my
safely parked vehicle a safe distance from the water and a safe and open walk
to a main school building. I keep my
eyes open for more parents from my son’s team, knowing that I am the first one
there but that they will soon follow. I
don’t get out of my car until I know there is safety in numbers. Yup, I am like the Safety Patrol. I may travel alone, but I’m not completely
reckless.
There are four possible
places to watch the lacrosse game that I’ve traveled a couple of hundred miles
to see. I can stand along the end of
field by the fence near the cars, which would provide many moments of imminent
danger as rubber balls shot at over ninety miles per hour race past my
skull. I could sit in the rickety stands
with the home crowd, where there is probably enough seating for twenty people. I could stand on the hill, a little too far
from the field and also in the crux of the Hudson River wind tunnel. Or, I could stand near the sideline fence
along with several other parents from my team, out of the worst of the wind and
close enough to the field to take pictures.
I opt for the latter since
my main pastime is to take a hundred or more pictures of the game.
It is here, along the
fence with my compadres, that I realize yet again I have that invisible target
painted on me. It’s like a creep magnet,
like flypaper for freaks, some kind of sonar that only certain people can
intercept (and never anyone I truly want to have intercept it). A thin man about my height and wearing a
flannel fur-lined cap with ear flaps sidles up next to me and strikes up a
conversation. He has a familiar look
about him, and I wonder if he is a parent from our team, as well, until he
opens his mouth to speak.
Nope, this guy is all New
York. His NY accent is thicker than
Boston molasses.
I start to realize that he
seems familiar to me because he kind of reminds me of a shorter version of
Harry Dean Stanton from Repo Man. In no time at all, I have his entire life
story – His son told him to come watch lacrosse because it’s a sport he’d probably
like. No, his son used to attend the
college but doesn’t anymore. As a matter
of fact, his son (the only child he and his wife have) is getting married next
October to a teacher. His boy is in the
media business. The college cafeteria
sells the best hot chocolate. The field
was put in a few years ago. The train
runs by the field on its way to the city.
The state is building a new Tappan Zee Bridge right near the park where
I visited earlier. There’s more, but I
am sure I’ve forgotten some of it.
While all of this is going
on, I am still trying to take pictures of the game. I steal a glance to my other side and see
some of the parents smirking. Yes, they
think this is funny that I have found a friend, or, rather, that the man has
found me as a friend.
Don’t get me wrong. The man is pleasant; talkative, but pleasant
in a New York-Meets- New England kind of way.
He and his wife, who is nowhere to be seen, have been married for over
thirty years. He somehow extracts from
me a bit of my life history, which endears him to me as if we have been friends
for all of our lives rather than the ten minutes we’ve actually shared
together. He disappears once then
reappears, picking up the conversation exactly where he left off as if we are
in a time warp and the scene just ceased to move on while he was away from it.
Weirdly, one moment we are
talking, then, as I look to my lacrosse friends and put the camera back to my
eye, I notice the New Yorker has disappeared again.
“This kind of stuff always
happens to me,” I lament to the parents.
They chuckle and think it’s oddly funny.
Yup, my life is a frigging laugh riot.
As if he’s an extra in Bewitched, my friend returns, appearing
next to me as magically as he had vanished moments earlier. In his hands are two steaming cups – both
full of hot chocolate from the college’s cafeteria. I am hoping it is safe to drink because I don’t
want to be impolite and, to be completely honest, I am freezing my ass off at
this point. The sun has gone away, and
an icy breeze is careening off the thunderously loud river.
Damn. He’s right. This is
some of the best hot chocolate I’ve had in a while.
The New Yorker chats for a
few minutes more then shakes my hand, glad to meet me though we’ve never
exchanged names at any point in the entire two-quarters-of-lacrosse-worth of conversation.
My whole New York trip I
have avoided interacting with anyone, watching out for my safety, minding my
own business. Then, in the most
populated and safest of all environments, I am approached by a complete stranger. The oddity of it all somehow relaxes me, as
if my uncomfortable moment for the day is passed, and it’ll be smooth sailing
from here.
Even though the GPS takes
me out a different way than I intended, the way I wanted to avoid, I make the
three-and-a-half hour trip back to Massachusetts without starting to feel tired
until route 2, so close to safety and home.
I crank up the music and sing to keep myself alert – Rush’s Freewill and Ted Nugent’s Stranglehold. Ironically after all that, the most dangerous
moment of my trip is when I hit black ice at my exit. Four hundred miles later and an adventure of
a lifetime, I crawl home and into bed because that five a.m. work wake-up is
going to totally suck eggs.
