In my home, there is hostile debate over the superiority of Raley’s supermarket locations.
My wife is a Lodi Raley’s sympathizer, while I champion Galt Raley’s.
Lodi is farther.
Galt is closer.
Lodi is cleaner.
Galt is bigger.
Lodi has two entrances.
Galt has one.
Lodi doesn’t need a security guard.
Galt does.
In Lodi, we always run into acquaintances.
In Galt, we are unknowns.
Six weeks ago, we decided to go to Galt Raley’s.
My wife’s pleas of “I’m pregnant,” (usually an argument ender) were no match for my calm, mercenary analysis of space and time.
This decision, to go to Galt Raley’s, turned out to be the lead domino, the snowball turned avalanche, that precipitated the weirdest fifteen minutes of my life.
*******
My wife volunteered to drive. So exhausted from a full day of yard work, the idea of an 8-month pregnant woman operating a motor vehicle seemed rational.
We turn right onto Twin Cities Road.
As we approach the Twin Cities bridge, we observe slowing in the distance. I see my pal Humberto, an off-duty volunteer fireman, jogging gingerly up the levee and onto the bridge.
I get out of the car and follow Humberto onto the puente.
The scene was a motorcycle laid down, missing its front end completely.
About 25 yards from the downed Harley is a large African American woman clutching her leg in agony ala Peter Griffin after hurting his knee..
With her leathers ripped and leg strawberried from Road Rash, she shouted, “The mother fucker jumped out in front of me!”
“What happened?” I ask Humberto.
Humberto says, “The Motorcyclist had a head on collision with a Pedestrian who was jumping off the bridge.”
Now, I’ve jumped off the Twin Cities bridge more times than I can count, but have only done so off the top of the bridge like a real man.
Sadly, this Bridge Jumper didn’t possess the same foresight and completely missed a two-hundred fifty pound black woman on a Harley barreling down from the opposing sideline.
Noticing there was only one victim on the bridge, I ask Humberto, “Where is the Pedestrian Bridge Jumper?”
He tells me that the Motorcyclist facilitated the Bridge Jumping process by launching said Pedestrian into the river.
Fortunately, a concerned citizen rescued the launchee via watercraft ala Mycroft Holmes saving Mary Mortsan in Game of Shadows and boated him to safety at a nearby marina.
I make the joke “Upon further review, the rusher was down at the point of contact.”
No one laughed.
Then I upped the ante and asked if the Bridge Jumper was playing “Chicken” with the Motorcyclist because she was Black.
That got at least an amused chuckle.
I wait for first responders to arrive, then jump back into the car with my wife. As we pull away from the scene, I begin to chastise Mrs. Wilson for not maneuvering her way through the emergency situation properly.
We start driving down Twin Cities, past the spot where my mother made her final ascension as it were, and I’m giving the love of my life unsolicited driving advice.
As we summit the I-5 overpass, I start questioning whether getting into an argument with a pregnant lady was a wise choice. We descend from the overpass and my wife and I stop bickering.
We see a White Dodge Charger pulled over and a couple, male and female (assumed genders) arguing in the Wilbur Ellis parking lot. My wife slowed to rubberneck and I ask, “Should I get out?”
My wife says “No. They’re ok.”
Then Homeboy starts hitting the woman, dragging her by her hair and trying to bring her back into the White Charger. She pulls away and tries to escape by running across the gravel, barefoot with Homeboy in pursuit.
I ask my wife again, ‘Should I get out?”
She says, “Yes. Absolutely.”
I tell Mrs. Wilson to call 911.
I’m wearing blue Havianna flip flops, pink board shorts and a USA Tank top. Not exactly the most intimidating attire when trying to resolve a couple having a domestic.
As Homeboy is flailing around and trying to hold onto the victim, I approach from about 30 yards away yelling, “You can’t hit women.”
He is enraged, but gangly and unarmed.
I am not a fighter. I hate confrontation, but whatever instincts of self-preservation I possess told me, “This guy is no threat.”
If my ten-year tenure at the Nick Diaz Academy has taught me anything, it’s that I can fuck up 99% of the untrained and unarmed populace.
(Later I’d learn that thinking someone is untrained or unarmed is more dangerous than assuming someone’s gender at a Nancy Pelosi Dinner Party…)
Homeboy starts walking toward me.
I think to myself, “Welp, I’m getting into a fight.”
Just as I am about to make contact with him, Homeboy says “Shit, I’m about to get another strike,” turns and bolts back to the White Charger.
Worried his next strike involves grabbing a gun and shooting me, I hustle the abuse victim into our car.
The battered woman tells me, “I have a restraining order against him! He kidnapped me.”
Holy Shit.
I tell Mrs. Wilson, “Drive.”
Thinking Homeboy was about to come back with a gun for a life sentence, we motor toward Duane Martin Jr.’s round pens on the corner of Franklin and Twin Cities Road.
Thankfully, the White Charger peels out, spitting a wake of dirt and gravel across Twin Cities road and speeds toward I-5.
I’m naturally paranoid. I knew we still weren’t safe.
As we pull up to the intersection, I see a friend of mine passing in the opposite lane. I flag him down.
He is perhaps the perfect person for these types of scenarios: a definitely armed, former spook who, for the sake of anonymity, we’ll call Primo.
I don’t believe in divine intervention, but my sister’s water broke on Twin Cities road, the same road my mother where my mother passed. (Perhaps, her water broke because the road is so bumpy and fucked up, but let me have my metaphor please.)
And here I am, getting into an impossible situation on the very same road and the best person for violent conflict resolution just happened to be driving by us.
The world works in mysterious ways.
As we wait for Officer’s to arrive, Primo and I talk outside my car.
Primo informed me that on the bravery-stupidity continuum, I had veered wildly into stupid territory…
What Primo didn’t know is that I had just written a treatise on stupidity.
Fortunately, he’s known me long enough to know that I have a black belt in getting into heroically irresponsible situations.
I try blaming my wife to no avail. Primo would hear none of it.
“It’s not your emergency.” he’d tell me and “If you’re out there alone that’s one thing, but with a pregnant wife, it changes the game completely. Next time, Call 911.”
Eventually, we drop off the poor battered woman at the Bruceville Correctional Facility because the Sheriff’s department never dispatched a unit to the scene. Short on staff, I learned that between Rancho Murrieta to Isleton there are only two deputies on duty.
Two!
This means Isleton is criminally underserved.
Isleton proper deserves, at minimum, one roving Sheriff to monitor local meth labs, Rogelio’s, trailer parks, Bay Area traffic and weed dispensaries.
This is totally hypocritical for me to say. Technically, I disbanded the Isleton Police Department.
Oops.
In all seriousness, I think it’s negligent to have only two deputies patrolling an over fifty-mile span, but imagine budget cuts and rampant crime in other parts of the county are to blame more than incompetent leadership.
The moral of the story is that you don’t fully appreciate first responders until you need them.
I’ve made fun of my little brothers for their concealed weapons permits, but in retrospect see the wisdom in having a CCW. With response times so long, you have to accept this:
Well, I guess that isn’t really the moral of the story. I didn’t get that until my wife and I got home three hours later. With a car load of groceries, I open the trunk and Mrs. Wilson turns to me and says,
“See I told you. Lodi Raley’s is better than Galt Raley’s.”