A STORY
WORTH TELLING
BY LEON ALDRIDGE
“The greatest lesson in life is realizing I still have a lot to learn.”
— Author unkown
The view from my window is thought provoking. I’ve always tried to learn from experience and by watching others.
From where I sit in my office on the southeast corner of the downtown Center square, I have a front row seat for many things. Chief among them in frequency is the sheer number of people in cars who don’t know how to drive. Or apparently, how to read traffic signs.
I also see a lot of wreckers. Towing services. “Why would I notice that” some may ask? It could be related to my first observation about people I see driving on the square. Or it could be related to experience. And memories. Because body shop paychecks working in at Sandlin Chevrolet and Olds, and Surratt and Heimer Body Shop in Mount Pleasant paid my way through college.
Johnny Garner at Sandlin’s took a chance on me based on experience gained working the previous summer at Ogner Volkswagen body shop in Canoga Park, California. A memorable summer gig for a 19-year-old, working for my Uncle Bill, the shop manager. And body shops introduced me to the world of wrecker driving. Experience that afforded me a lot more stories worth telling than did painting cars.
In the late 60s, wrecker services were on 24-hour call for periods of one week at a time. As the newbie at Sandlins, I was quickly tagged “the wrecker driver.”
Mostly because no one looked forward to taking the wrecker home at night and sleeping close to the phone for middle of the calls from the police department.
Wrecker driving was also my introduction to jobs where your clientele are people who are not having a good day.
Rushing to help someone who has either been involved in a wreck or had car trouble.
Every time I bailed out of bed at 1:00 a.m. and hit the road resulted in a different story.
Like the family I rescued from the side old roadside park on Highway 67 toward Omaha. Where their big Olds VistaCruiser station wagon’s transmission had given up the ghost and left them stranded. I arrived and hooked on to the crippled cruiser. Then engineered a man, his wife, their child, and the family dog into the cab. Miraculously, there was still room for me to drive. And by the time I dropped them off at the Holiday Inn, we were all close friends. Almost too close.
Other memories: some still haunt me.
It was before the invention of “The Jaws of Life.” A time when wrecker drivers were called on to pull mangled doors open or raise crushed car tops. Hopefully to free injured occupants. Not just to aid in the removal of bodies.
Occasionally, there were rewards. Like the time I worked a truck wreck on I-30.
An overturned semi with a full load. Of bananas. Green bananas. The job took more than one wrecker service. When the rig was righted and ready to tow, the truck driver announced, “Take some of these bananas. We can’t sell them since they’ve been involved in an accident,” he said. “So, take a case. Or two. Or three.”
I stacked my bounty in the kitchen that night relishing the thought of fresh bananas. But I failed to factor in one thing. The bananas would get ripe. Every one of them at the same time. Mom made banana pudding and banana bread. We ate bananas on cereal. We ate bananas on ice cream. On toast. On things I would never have thought of eating. We shared bananas with family, friends, neighbors, perfect strangers.
And with any job, there are always the weird and wacky stories. Warped humor, maybe. But they are stories because laughing is better than crying.
The phone rings and in minutes, I’m on my way out Highway 67 again. No details, just that DPS needs a wrecker.
Wee hours of the morning and foggy. I pull up behind the cruiser on the side of the road. Lights f lashing. No vehicle in sight. Just the officer waving his red baton flashlight, and the shaken-up driver sitting in the car.
The trooper pointed out the local funeral home’s hearse. Down an embankment, front end in a creek bottom. Barely visible from the road. Wrecker set; I make my way down to the hearse pulling the cable. Winch in freewheel. After slithering up under the vehicle in the damp darkness and securing the cable on the rear axle, I open the driver’s door to make sure the transmission is in neutral.
In the glow of my flashlight, the first thing I saw was the last thing one wants to see in the middle of a foggy night. The impact had broken the casket from its mount in the back, propelling it forward, allowing the dearly departed to partially depart the damaged casket.
I jumped back, fell down, dropped my f lashlight. Said things I never let fly in front of my sweet Momma.
Gathering my wits and attempting to get up, I heard hee-hawing from up the hill. “I forgot to tell you the funeral home is dispatching another hearse to transfer the body,” the officer said through his uncontrolled laughter. “As soon as you get that one back up to the highway.”
Some things have changed since then.
I’ve learned that wreckers are better and safer. Cars are better and safer. Drivers on the other hand, not so much. That at this age, I still have a lot to learn.
And laughing still beats crying.
