So I'm coming to the end of the Elgin-O'Hare expressway doing about 65 & I see a stranded car in the inner most lane. As I pass them I notice it's a very old woman & she has an even older lady in the back seat. I immediately hit the brakes, pull over to the shoulder, hit the hazards & back up the shoulder (like an idiot to help them).
I do my best to sprint across 3 lanes of pissed-off / swerving / honking drivers (all going about 50 mph inches from me). I arrive at her car & tell her to put it in neutral & I'll push her to the side of the road where it will be safer...
She says, "There's nothing wrong with my car, I'm just lost"!
Apparently she & her passenger were arguing about her being lost & not wanting to get on the 290 expressway so she'd slowed down, came to a stop, put it in park & turned off the engine (right in the middle of 3 lanes of 55 mph traffic)!
I plead with her to get into the backseat with the passenger so I can drive them over to the shoulder & out of the ever pressing traffic issue they are creating... She immediately doesn't trust me, she thinks I'm a car-jacker!
Yes, a car-jacker roaming the highways of the northwest Chicago suburbs at 10:30 in the morning looking for lost grandmas so he can steal their 1994 champaign-colored Toyota Camry (Kelley Blue Book $500)!
I think to myself I definitely look like a car-jacker dressed in Lululemon Yoga shorts, flip-flops & an Iowa shirt driving a car that costs 9-10 times that of theirs... (I digress)
So, I begin to negotiate, to sell, to pray, I eventually swear on my children's lives that I am not in-fact a car-jacker... All the while cars are zooming 5 feet from us, slamming on their brakes behind her car & honking repeatedly (so helpful)... Finally I garner her approval, she gets into the backseat & I pull them to the side of the road safely. FYI, pulling across 3 lanes of expressway traffic isn't as sexy as it sounds.
After a few minutes of calming them down I ask Thelma & Louise (90-100 years old, if a day) where they were going? "Home" the driver says...
"What's the address" I ask...?
Pause for the silence...
Another pause for concerning look...
A not-so silent discussion ensues between the 2 in the backseat as if they are whispering, but a man 100 ft from us could clearly hear them...
Another minute passes...
And I'm here to tell you, even after all we'd been through, me risking life to get there & drive them back, for the life of me, the driver would not tell me her address...
Why you may wonder? You guessed it... Stalker!
Although she knew I wasn't a daytime-grandma-pos-car-jacker, I could still be a perverted sex craved elderly women stalker!
After another 5-minutes of "quiet" discussion in the backseat she compromises & agrees to tell me an intersection nearby where she lives... She says to me, it is in "Arlington Heights on Arlington Heights Road"... Bing, intersection, I can do that... It's vague, but not to shabby for a recently accused car-jacking sex perverted old-lady stalker! I head to my truck to get my iPhone...
Side-note #1: The entire time I'm inside the car with the two women the elderly passenger keeps saying "she's not allowed to drive on the expressway" & the driver keeps telling her to "hush up"! Like it was a big damn secret? I'm right in the front seat, it's not like you're whispering ladies & you're both like 100 years old... Ha!
Side-note #2: Come to find out one lady had taken the other to a doctors appointment & they had gotten lost on the way home... When the passenger said the driver couldn't go on the expressway (for like the 100th time I'm guessing) the driver just parked it!
Side-note #3: The reason the driver was lost... They'd driven a block too far south & the road they were on was not on the map she had been using! Yes, the yellowing map didn't have the Elgin-O'Hare Expressway on it. Coincidentally, the map may have been from 1975...
Back to the story...
I get my phone & use google maps to locate where we are & a general vicinity to where they're headed (aka- the intersection). I then painstakingly explain to them they need to follow the road we're on just a mile east & turn left on Arlington Heights Road & that will take them North directly into Arlington Heights!
The driver says "I won't be able to make it" & the passenger repeats the aforementioned "not allowed on the Expressway" comment. Luckily I think the driver didn't hear her that time & no more "whispering" breaks out in the backseat.
Since she's not sure she can go it alone I volunteer to pull up & drive in front of them for the mile. I instruct her that when I stick my arm out the window & point left they should get in the left lane & turn left onto Arlington Heights Road.
"I'm not sure, maybe" she says...
Just as I'm about to drive them to the "intersection" & call a cab back to my car there's a rap on the window (which scared the crap out of me... Hey, cars are whipping by us the entire time we're on the side of the road.)...
It's the Police... Yeah!
I roll down the window & the officer asks me to step out of the car... So... I get out of the car!
Here's how it went:
Officer: What's going on here? (stern tone, concerned look)
Me: These two ladies are lost... (I get the feeling I'm in trouble here)
Officer: Who's car is this? (Looks at me like I'm from Mars, sizing me up)
Me: The 2 ladies in the back seat (Note to self, remember to get the names of people you're trying to help while also not getting run over... You don't want to look like a car-jacker... Duh Kyle!)
Officer: Why are you sitting in the front seat of their car? (untrusting tone, defensive body positioning, visually checking me for weapons)
Me: When I pulled up they were just parked in the middle of the highway & I had to drive them over here out of traffic... (I'm gonna get arrested for car-jacking 2 old ladies, if I don't get shot first)
Officer: Why did they stop in the middle of the road? (Checking my facts a little deeper, mentally locating his tazzer & gun... Didn't the guy see the yoga shorts & flip-flops? Iowa shirt? Nothing? I'm screwed!)
Me: She said she was lost Sir... (Pretty sure I'm gonna get tazzed & shot for car-jacking 2 old ladies, contemplating running even though I'm 100% innocent)
I slowly hand him the map & even more slowly point to the bottom of the map & explain they went too far south for their map & when they got lost, they began to argue & the driver just stopped. (even though every word was true I found myself hoping he would "buy it" & not send me to old-lady-car-jacking-pervert prison)
The Officer steps back, smiles, relaxes his posture, looks at the map & says...
"Are you shitting me, she just stopped in the middle of the Expressway?"
Me: No officer, I'm serious, she even turned off the engine! (I'm no longer under suspicion, unclench butt-cheeks, return to normal breathing)
Officer: I got this, thanks for your help!
The officer takes the map, goes to the front of the car & radios in to run the plates & tags (4 years of Chips, 8 years of Law & Order, I know some things)...
As I walk away the driver (still in the backseat) rolls down the window slowly & looks at me with a very concerned look on her face... Me wanting to calm her I stop, lean in & reassure her the officer is going to help her get home safely & theres nothing to fear (I didn't want her to be scared)...
And what does the driver for which I've just risked life & limb to keep from getting into an accident say to me the Good Samaritan?
I ask you again... What do you think this kind little 85-pound-125-year-old-fragile-see-through-skin-having-must-have-dated-Abraham-Lincoln-when-he-was-Freshman-and-she-was-a-Senior-Grandmother-from-the-Norman-Rockwell-painting say to me after my brave & courageous good deeds had kept her & her friend out of harms way?
"Where's he going with my fucking map?"
