A Strange Thing Happened This Afternoon

I'm still not sure what I think about this strange event. I wonder what you would have done?

I was talking with my neighbor while we watched my daughter plant tulip bulbs late this afternoon. The neighbor children were quickly enthralled with helping her put the bulbs in the ground. So Mom came out to talk while I was watching.

I think we talked about an hour while the kids were having fun. The weather was absolutely balmy for this late in October in Michigan. Everyone was having fun. My son brought out the cat for the little ones to pet.

A lady came walking by during our conversation. I went inside for a moment and came back out to find her talking with my neighbor. I thought they were friends. Perhaps it was another neighbor since we have only been in this town for 6 months. I guessed from the conversation that this person needed a ride as she was too tired to walk any further, so I volunteered to take her to her friend's house. I got my purse and keys and we left.

On the way, the woman whom I guessed was a little bit older than I, introduced herself and gave me directions. She told me she had walked from the local nursing home (about 8 blocks) where she had been with a group of church people singing and talking to the residents. She asked what church I went to and I told her. She mentioned what sounded like a last name or a first name. I named a couple of people I knew and she seemed to know the ones I mentioned. (Looking back, I shouldn't have done that!) About 5 minutes later I dropped her off to her friend's house.

When I returned home, the neighbor was inside but her children were still playing outside. I greeted them on my way inside. By this time it was early dusk and with my family all in the living room. We decided what we would fix for supper. Suddenly there was a knock at the door. I opened it and there was that woman again--the one I had dropped off at her friend's home. Come to find out that her friends couldn't take her home. She asked if we could take her. I asked hubby if we could and he agreed. I decided by this time that it would be safer if the entire family came along for the ride. Things just weren't adding up right in my mind. Alarm bells were going off.

When we lived in the country, it wasn't unusual for people to know that we took in stray animals and took care of them. The four-legged kind. This was the first time a two-legged stray had been dropped off at our home. Bizarre.

We tried to figure out why she needed a ride. Apparently her car had broken down on the road and it was taken to a repair shop. But the location didn't make sense to my husband and me. We got the idea that it had broken down after she was at the nursing home doing her good deed. But the car wasn't in town. It was in a neighboring town. She gave us directions to her home and we took off.

In my mind I was wondering why, if she came with a group of people, they would have left her at the nursing home without taking her home again, especially if her car had broken down before getting to her destination. She had come by our house around 6 PM. Would a church group have stayed that late to talk to the residents? She didn't explain why she was left behind. We tried to get her to explain where her car was. She gave a basic location, but after we dropped her off at her home (if indeed that was her home) we checked and couldn't find the place. Of course, it was in the dark.

It took us about 45 minutes to take her to her home. She had only given us a general idea of where she was and it wasn't where we expected. I asked her why her friends couldn't drop her off at her home. She said that something was wrong with their truck and they couldn't drive it that far. It had been recalled and they weren't supposed to drive it at all. (I thought to myself, why would her friends drop her off at a perfect strangers' house??? Some friends! Why didn't they contact someone else in the church?)

All during the conversation to her home, she spoke in generalities, about her hardships living on social security, having car problems, a broken stove, etc. She broke down and nearly cried several times. I was wondering if we were being taken "for a ride." We didn't know what to make of the whole situation. Her exact relationship with the churches mentioned were at best nebulous, vague. I don't think we got a straight answer out of one question we asked. In for a penny, in for a pound! She did make it inside her home. There was a dog there, so my theory that she was a resident of the nursing home and running away could not have been true. The dog was healthy and cheerful. No alarms. The trailer home was tucked away in a tiny backwoods community that basically only an owner could have given such correct directions to. But things still didn't make sense to us.

On the way back, it was dark, but my husband was still uneasy. He wasn't sure she had dropped off her car at a legitimate car repair shop. He took her name and phone number. When she asked for ours, we told her we would give it to her when we called her back.

I don't know what we are going to do next. Call her, I guess. Then what? She was talking about having us find her another car that didn't have 300,000 plus miles on it. She even told us what colors she didn't like. She did say she had a brother. Downstate. And she has children, grown, and apparently not paying her much mind. I don't know.

What would you do?

By the way, we checked the house when we got back. Nothing was stolen. sigh.