Get comfortable, this story is going to take a while. I don’t mean to sound dramatic (well, maybe I do), but I had quite a traumatic night on Wednesday. After my day at work and then kickball in the early evening I was in the mood to just be by myself, away from people. I decided I wanted to go for a run on the bike trail at the friendly Sertoma Park. Thunderstorms were looming and there was lightning in the west so I figured I better hurry to get my run in before the rain.
The run was very refreshing, but toward the end of it, as I was heading back to Sertoma Park the lightning and wind really started picking up. As I was nearing my car the rain came. I reached down to take my car key out of my shoe and … it was gone! Now, I have been intertwining my key in my shoelaces while I run for the past two years and have never lost it. Why then? Why such bad timing? I was standing in the pouring rain, right next to my car and I could not get in. Even if I found a phone somewhere and called a locksmith, once I got in my car I would not be able start it. All of the buildings at the park were closed by this time so I did not even know where to go or what to do. I felt so completely helpless.
The first thing that came to my mind was “you have to find that key.” I started walking back over the elevated trail (which included a bridge) in the middle of all the lightning and rain. It was probably not the safest move, but I was determined to find this key. As I walked along I realized I couldn’t see anything because of the rain and the clouds covering the sun so searching for my key was stupid at this point. I was also thoroughly drenched and cold. I ran another ¼ mile to where the Interstate crosses the trail and sat under the bridge on some Red Sioux Quartzite rocks. I was so depressed. I started sobbing.
After about ten minutes I decided I wanted to keep looking for the car key. The rain let up for a moment and I started searching along the trail again. I walked about another ¼ mile and then it began to rain pretty hard. The next overpass was a couple hundred feet away so I ran to it and sat under there for twenty minutes. Thoughts like “you are never going to find your key,” “you are going to die out here” and “lions and raccoons are going to eat you” kept running through my mind (even though I knew I probably would not really die or be eaten alive). It was right at this point, when I was so hopeless, that a lady came running along the trail right by me. She stopped to ask if I was okay and I told her my story. She said she, or maybe it was someone she knew, lost his/her car key and did not have a spare. A dealership made a new one and it only cost $30. This made me feel a lot better. I knew if the key did not turn up and I could make it home somehow I could call a dealership the next morning and get a new key made.
Right after she left the rain subsided and what was left of the sun at 9:00 pm peeked through the departing clouds. A cold front came through with the storm and I was still wet so I was pretty cold just sitting under the overpass. I decided to walk the rest of the distance I ran along the trail earlier in the night to see if I could find my key. If I could not find it after that I would wait until tomorrow morning and call a dealership.
Because of the large amount of rain the trail was flooded in parts. This made looking for the key a bit tricky, but I walked down the entire trail I had run on before and still could not find my key. Turning around I walked back, still searching, awhile longer. I cut across the river and started walking along 57th St. to a gas station. 57th St. is a road with a lot of new developments on it so it does not have always have sidewalks. In fact, the part I was walking along was very muddy because there was no grass planted yet. After I maneuvered the deep mud, there was very steep ditch. I was hanging on for dear life to these metal ropes that ran along the road while trying to pull myself along toward the gas station. What terrible luck.
Finally, I reached the gas station and I tried to think of some people I knew who might give me a ride home. The four phone numbers I could remember that I tried all went to voice mail. I left messages and waited at the gas station for about ten minutes, but no one returned my calls. I knew my best option was to walk home. The gas station attendant said she would tell anyone who called back that I started walking home along 57th St.
When I got home 30 minutes later Dawn and Kellie were there so they let me in. I borrowed Kellie’s car and drove it to Sertoma Park so I could get the VIN from my car, which I would need to get a new key made.
The next morning I told Julie I would be about an hour late to work and I called the parts guy at a Chevy dealership in town. He said it would cost right around $50 for a new key. Okay, I do not have a lot of extra cash to be spent on things like that so I took Kellie’s car (Dawn gave her a ride to work – God bless them … and America) back to the park and told myself I had 20 minutes to look for my key. If I did not find it in that time I would have to go to the dealership and shell out the $50.
I walked for approximately 200 feet and I found it! It was such a beautiful moment in my life. It was like Christmas. It was better than Christmas. And in the end it wasn’t even about the $50. I was happiest I found the key because I had spent so much time looking for it and walked so far along the flooded trail, in the mud, pouring rain and lightning. I was so ready to spend time by myself that night and when I finally got my wish and I was all along crying under the overpass all I wanted was someone to magically come and save me. Crazy how that works.
No comments:
Post a Comment