For those who love to say “That awkward moment when…”, have I a story for you. Most people follow that phrase with something that is completely irrelevant and ‘unawkward.’ However something that truly is awkward happened on Friday the 13.
In effort to save myself from the ill-fated day, I went to Crabtree Mall with a friend. I thought some retail therapy may deter any unfortunate situations, but I was wrong.
My story starts with the various near-death experiences in the car ride to the mall. My friend, who recently got her license, is far from a professional driver. Once I made it there alive, our shopping trip was dull and uneventful, which was quite a disappointment.
While pulling out of our parking spot, she almost hit another car and by this point, I was scared of her shaky driving skills. The terror continued as we turned down Creedmoor Road. While attempting to merge to another lane, my friend forgot to check her blind spot. As we drifted toward an innocent driver, she finally realized there was another vehicle there. The older, more experienced driver politely moved out of the way and kindly waved.
After catching my breath, we pulled up behind the same man at the red light on Glenwood. Looking ahead I noticed his license plate. It read, “IBCRUSEN.” My friend and I immediately turned to each other and burst into laughter. This old geezer claimed he is “cruisin’” in his little blue car.
I quickly reached for my phone to snap a picture of this oxymoron in front of me. As I fumbled through my various apps, I finally found my camera icon. While I situated my phone to catch the best shot of this, something strange began happening. My friend pointed out that his car door was ajar. We soon spotted his denim legs emerging from the Ford. We began to get scared, was this man a predator? Was he coming for us? In my panic, I quickly locked the doors.
He advanced toward us while we sat dumbfounded. A huge rush of relief overcame us when the old man rounded the corner of his bumper and stood proudly next to his license plate. With a thumbs up, he posed adjacent to his the metal plate. As if his car was an old friend, he placed his hand on the trunk and popped his other arm up to his hip. Confused and amused, I was still holding my phone out and quickly photographed this strange moment.
I responded to his odd action with a thumbs up which meant I got the picture. He swaggered back to the driver’s seat and closed the royal blue door. Not knowing what just hit us, we giggled in disbelief. Soon we noticed his little sunglass covered eyes, peeping on us in the rearview mirror.
We recovered ourselves and my friend exclaimed, “Tweet it, Tweet it!” So I did, with a caption that summed up our strange encounter. This situation was awkward because the irony of the man’s frumpy blue car and his apparent pride about it. Nonetheless, our near death experience was actually “That awkward moment when…”.
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