Very long strange story

Something happened this afternoon that was about as bazaar as it can get. I was hauling manure a mile and a half north of here up a gravel road. A quarter of a mile north of the house,there's a hill that goes down to a lake,then the road curves around the lake a little,then up another hill.

First load there was a square five gallon cat litter bucket turned upside down by the end of the guardrail where folks put their boat in to go fishing. There was a car sitting just a little ways up the hill on the other side of the curve,within sight of the bucket. I don't know how any of your minds work,but I had a little thought of IED and people in a car waiting for a target to set it off.

I got up close to the car and the drivers side door started to open. A young gal,I'd guess mid to later twenties,wearing a tank top,reddish blonde hair done up on op of her head,green eyes,got out. There was a guy sitting in the passenger seat. She stumbled a little so I knew she'd been drinking or something. I opened the door of the tractor and she stepped up in front of the tire.

I asked her if something was wrong. She talked pretty slow,but not slurred. She asked me if I was plowing that field. I said no,I own it but I'm not plowing it. I reached up to turn off the radio and she got a look of total defeat on her face and she said "Don't push the button". I don't know if she thought I was gonna call the cops or set off whatever was under that bucket.

I asked her again if she needed any help. She teared up and said she was just having a real bad day. I asked her what was wrong (again) and she told me she was from North Carolina,joined the army and now she was up here. She had tears running down her face and said she missed her dad and the farm. I was getting kind of choked up,but at the same time a little nervous about the guy in the car. He slid over in to the drivers seat.

I asked if that was her husband. She said "Yes....unfortunately.". I said "Well,he can help you". She looked down and said "He doesn't understand". Then she asked me again what I was doing. I told her I was hauling manure up the road where I was gonna plant oats. She said we have a lot of fields around here,a lot bigger than back home. I told her my wife's family lives in Kentucky and I knew what she meant,not many big fields in the mountains.

She asked if my wife drives the tractor. I told her not much,but she's good with the cows. She said ya,the cows aren't much work,they take care of themselves and said she really missed driving the tractor. I told her I'd be working ground in a week or so if she wanted to drive back around.

I want to say this is where it really got weird,but the whole thing already was. looked up at me and said "you're young". I laughed and said "I'm 64". (I rounded up two months) She said "You are not!". I told her ya I am. She said "You're a very attractive man.". I thought here we go,get the old guy flustered,the guy gets out with a gun and I get shot because all I have on me is about eighty cents in change,a jack knife,lighter and a pen. He's gonna be frustrated that he's not getting anything and kill me.

Obviously it didn't happen,but she told me her name was April. I told her my name and asked if she lived around here then. She said yea,she lived in town. I said Sheridan? She said "how did you know?" I told her it was only a mile away. I was getting nervous and wanted to get out of there,so I told her maybe I'd see her in town some day and that I hoped she had a better day. She said "This helped".

When I drove away,she was standing by the open door and it looked like her husband was just trying to keep her from getting in the drivers seat. When I cam home empty,the car was still there but nobody was in it. When I was loading the next load,I saw them come down the road. They stopped on the corner and a local guy who grew up right up the road saw them and pulled around the corner and talked to them for a few minutes,so must be he knew them. They left in opposite directions.

I don't know what was going on,if she had PTSD and didn't dare drive past that bucket of if a 70 degree sunny day with the grass greening up just had her super homesick for her dad and the farm. I still feel choked up from her crying,was scared from the guy who was sitting in the car and pretty darned flattered with what she said to me.

I guess if you live in North Carolina and your daughter is in Michigan,give her a call,she misses you.

Whew. Well done and thank your goodness. Jim

Many years ago in my neck of the woods everyone knew everyone and in a similar incident I would have stopped and would have tried to find out what was going on and if I could help, but today, it is a different world. No one knows anyone and can't trust anyone and if I wasn't packing a firearm, I would have pulled the throttle down and kept on trucking hoping that they didn't start shooting at me first. I'm 68 years old and too young to get killed in someone else's family argument.

I probably would have called 911 and reported the situation, let the local officials investigate.

Rich

Sounds like a proposition was in the works.

Once you started talking about wife and family she probably knew this wasn't going to happen.

Still a scary situation. I would have been thinking the same thing, a robbery about to happen.

I had a similar occurrence a couple years ago, in a city park at noon, eating my lunch in the truck.

A young black couple was walking around the park, holding hands, laughing, nothing unusual. Then the lady suddenly appears at my window, the man is no where in sight. I thought she was going to ask for a handout, a common occurrence there.

But she starts up a pleasant conversation. I noticed she was very attractive, well dressed, and well spoken, something that didn't match up with the typical drugged out hookers that are sometimes in the area.

She quickly noticed I was reading the next weeks Sunday School lesson, so she steered the conversation toward church activities.

But after a couple minutes it was back to business and she asked how my love life was. I told her I was quite happy with my wife and needed to keep it that way.

"Well, OK, I guess I'll see you around then..."

I really wanted to ask why she was putting herself out there like that, obviously she could do better, but the words were just too slow coming.

I assume the man was either her pimp, or they may have been undercover cops.

I was still nervous, wondering where Bubba went!

They disappeared as quickly as they appeared, no car left, don't know where they went. I cut my lunch short and got outta there!

Wasn't the April I know.

Not strange. Just drugs. Glad you got your done.

You are right Randy, that is a strange story We get a lot of weird birds around here too, being so close to Toronto. And you were , in my mind very correct to be concerned about the fella in the car. No way of knowing what kind of whack job that guy could turn out to have been.

Glad you got your work done.

She's been trolling YT and recognized you from the pic of you in your FFA jacket meeting Miss Minnesota.

They?d probably been smoking a little pot she probably thought she was still driving down the road .

Bruce, didn't you find a couple of ladies fooling around in the back seat of their car in the back field a few years back?
Believe it or not it's just not that rare an occurance.... we've seen all kinds of similar strange things over the years. We are basically right in the middle of Richmond / Vancouver and city people don't need to go too far to "park".

But the best are when the GPS tries to direct them straight through our fields into the mud in the middle of the night...$80,000 + super low Mercedes and Audis trying to make it home. In their defence our gravel farm roads are pretty good..... until the last 200' before the highway. But they already lost the exhaust by then.
Even though it's easy enough to pull them out with one of the tractors, I told dad just to call a wrecker next time. Too much liability involved.

Randy, that was strange and hopefully they were just a bit doped up and not too crazy. Take care out there.

Grant

It's nice to be helpful, but things are so different today, so many creeps out there, I would have turned the throttle up, blew some black smoke and waved hi. On the other hand I'm wondering, maybe you were using your White field boss tractor with the cab? But I don't remember what kind of manure spreader you have! Lol, glad your safe!

Pretty weird I came up on a gal a while back that ran her truck into the ditch got stuck. I offered to tug her back on the road she said hay man I gotta go I can?t be waitin on no redneck farmboss. I told her hey I got a strap it will just take a minute you will be on your way. Pulled her out onto the road un hooked her truck she drove off like a house on fire. She never said thanks kiss my fanny not anything just burned up the road. Gotta be careful there is a lot of wingnuts out there.

If indeed she's in the army, she's likely to get discharged soon. No tolerance for drug use.

They were real tears she was crying. She was either being honest,or she was awful sorry for what the guy in the car was planning. When the other local guy who I know well,stopped and talked to them at the stop sign,it eased my mind that she was legit. I don't know that it was a proposition. She didn't tell me I was attractive and tell me her name until after we talked about my wife.

That is strange. Anymore I think twice about stopping for anyone or anything ! Just the other day at the gas station a gal was filling up a 1 gallon gas can and starting to walk down the road. My first thought was she ran her car out of gas and to ask if she needed a ride. Then my next thoughts were of all the "me too" allegations so I minded my own business and kept going.

Good chance she wouldn't have gotten in with you anyway Mike. It's a calloused world out there. I'm just not ready to give up my compassion and empathy just yet though. I'd still like to believe there's a special place in Heaven for those who'll help somebody out.

I used to wonder why my dad would stop and offer to help some of the people that he did,but I can see it now. I never knew my grandpa,but they say that back in the depression,hobos would stop around looking for food. They say grandma would feed them but wouldn't let them in the house. Grandpa would take his plate outside and eat with them. I guess it's in my genes. It hasn't bit me in the backside yet.

If smelling manure and diesel fuel and talking to a farmer who listened and didn't blow her off telling her to get it together and quit crying,kept her from doing something desperate that she wouldn't live to regret,I'm happy that I stopped. I had to laugh earlier in the day. I took a load of cattle to the sale barn and stopped at Farm and Home on the way home. I had a whole big cart full of pails and jugs of oil,filters,belts,salt blocks and cat food. Two checkouts were open and people were backed up out in the aisle. A guy walked up with just a PVC fitting. I told him if that's all he had,go ahead,no sense getting behind me.

We got up to where two lines formed,he went left and I went right. The gal on the right had been there a long time and the one on the left was new. I was all checked out and he was still second in line. He laughed and said "You still beat me out of here". I laughed too and said "I guess it pays to be a nice guy sometimes.".

Hmmm....I thought I knew where this story was headed but.....well, I'm glad your safe.

I'm going to take a guess here. I would say, she was contemplating going AWOL, or not reporting back for duty. Her husband/BF was trying to either convince her to go AWOL, or convince her to go back and finish her enlistment, and they were having a serious disagreement.

Hard to say which way, but my gut tells me she wanted to go back, and her husband wanted her to go AWOL. But - admit it could be all eye-wash as well.

She mentioned the Army, and seems like a lot of nostalgia for her family farm.

Glad it all worked out, sounds like two young people in trouble. For my part, when a young woman tells me I'm very attractive I tend not to believe anything else she says LOL

Strange things happen. . .

Wife and I were sitting on our screened porch the other night. It was dark as a dungeon, and we have no all-night yard light because we like it dark. We heard footsteps in the gravel road in front of the house and it sounded like people talking or maybe laughing. As the steps got in front of us, we could see that it was one woman and she was crying. We live way out in the sticks, and the road goes on past our house and turns into dirt on Shawnee Forest property. Why was she walking out of that wilderness by herself at 10 pm, and crying? She walked on by as we remained silent, not knowing we were 50 feet away. I knew that the right thing to do was see if she needed help, so I reluctantly hollered HEY at her. The footsteps stopped and I asked her if she needed help. No - she was out for a walk (with no flashlight?). I asked if she was ok, and she sobbed yes - she was walking home. I asked her where she lived, and she said up the road and started walking again. I said ok and sat back down.

I have no idea who this woman was or what was wrong, and she obviously did not want me to know who she was. We would have tried to help her, but I am not gonna force help on anyone.

Well done, Sometimes a smile a friendly hello is all it takes. If everyone lived the Golden Rule and treated people like we would like to be treated it would be a nicer world.