My First Car Accident (4th 1st)

[Stephanie over at Cool People I Know (whom I found via Jen Lemen) has tagged her readers to jump in on her meme and provide a list of five firsts. This is my third first. Read the others here.]

I'm sitting in a line of traffic about 10 cars long, backed up at a busy intersection. To my left, and across the oncoming lane of traffic, is the parking lot of a bar/pizza joint. I see a car start to back out of the parking lot. He backs across the oncoming lane of traffic and right into my front driver's side.

We both pull into the parking lot and get out of our cars. The other driver, a guy in his early 20's, speaks the first words between us: "Didn't you see me?"

I want to say: "Yes, I saw you as you backed into oncoming traffic and then into my car. Yes. I saw you, dude."

But in the end, I just say: "Didn't you see me?"

At first he seems stunned to realize that the accident is his fault, but then quickly adopts a "my bad" attitude and apologizes several times. We exchange insurance information.

While we sit there and wait for the police, whom I called after realizing that he smelled strongly of beer, he tries to bond with me. "Hey, I see the sticker in your window for that local public radio station. I listen to them to!"

Then he tries to make me feel bad for him because now he'll be late for the gig his band is playing at a house party tonight. I tell him that I'll be late for friends who were going to stop by my place. I also explain that if he's drunk, I don't want him to hurt anyone or himself. He says, "I told you. I had one beer. That's all."

I want to keep him in a good mood so he'll stick around. (I'm actually surprised he hasn't gotten belligerent or just taken off.) I say, "Tell you what. If the cops tell me you're not drunk, I will apologize to you."

"Okay," he says. "But I think you're gonna owe me an apology."

Forty minutes later a State Trooper is handcuffing him and arresting him for DUI.

Dude.

My First Trip to NYC (3rd 1st)

[Stephanie over at Cool People I Know (whom I found via Jen Lemen) has tagged her readers to jump in on her meme and provide a list of five firsts. This is my third first. Read the others here.]

The first time I visited New York City, I forgot about the Statue of Liberty.

A carfull of friends decided to drive from our beach house in Ocean City, NJ to NYC. We were there as part of a summer program of learning, fellowship, and discipleship. A bunch of college students from different schools, learning to live, play, work, cook, eat, pray, worship, and study together. It was like MTV's Real World for Christians: less hot tub debauchery and more Bible study.

Saturdays were our free time, so five of us piled into one car and made the 2.5 hour car trip to the city that never sleeps.

I don't remember what I expected to see or do in New York. I don't think I had many preconceived notions. At this point in my life, I hadn't traveled much and had never lived in a large city. I was just excited about the idea of New York.

As we approached the city and drove across a bridge, I looked across the backseat and out the driver's side window. There, in the distance, rising up out of the water, small but unmistakable, was the Statue of Liberty.

"Look!" I cried. "It's the Statue of Liberty!"

From the joy and awe in my voice, you would have thought I'd been waiting my whole life to see this landmark, as if I were an avid tourist, or a hungry immigrant.

The sheer surprise and happiness of seeing the Statue of Liberty caught me off-guard. It's not that I'd been looking forward to seeing it. It's that I had completely forgotten about its existence.

Lady Liberty is practically synonymous with the Big Apple. Yet I hadn't included it in my mental checklist of things to see while in New York. But there it was. Big -- and real -- as life. Here was this famous icon and I was seeing it in person, with my own eyes.

At that moment I felt like I was living life for once, rather than life living me. I can't explain how, but seeing the statue reminded me that the world is full of possibilities, even when we don't see them coming.

I thought of this story last weekend while I was in New York City for the ASJA writer's conference. I looked out of my hotel window on the 34th Floor and saw a large, silver gargoyle two buildings over.

As I was walking back to my hotel one day, I saw the building with the gargoyles on it and noticed how shiny it was. Suddenly I heard little orphan Annie proclaiming, "You'll stay up till this dump shines like the top of the Chrysler building." It was the Chrysler Building I'd seen from my window! I had the same feeling of recognition that I'd had 11 years earlier when I "discovered" the Statue of Liberty.

I'm looking for obvious monuments. The things in my life that are always there, whether I see them or not. The signposts that reassure me that whether I remember them or not, they stand strong and solid, ready to delight me.

My First Tofu (2nd 1st)

[Stephanie over at Cool People I Know (whom I found via Jen Lemen) has tagged her readers to jump in on her meme and provide a list of five firsts. This is my second first. Read the others here.]

The first time I ate tofu I thought it was cheese. Until I tasted it. You know that feeling when you watch someone drinking a glass of cola or iced tea or orange juice and you take a sip of your water or milk or V8 and you're shocked and confused by the discordant taste sensation? My first tofu was like that, only much worse. The pale little cubes on the cafeteria line looked like cheese. And I love cheese. But this was a piece of plain, mushy tofu.

After that I thought I hated tofu. Two nights ago I had a really bad tofu stir-fry that reminded me how much I thought I hated it. But I know that tofu is a lot like vegetables: People think they hate them because they've never had them cooked well. My dad claims to hate all cooked vegetables beyond corn and potatoes. But last Christmas when I sauteed green beans with olive oil and toasted almonds, he decided to try a few. "These don't taste like green beans," he said. I said that he was probably comparing them to the canned variety he'd had in the past. "No," he said. "These don't taste at all like green beans."

For me, good tofu doesn't taste at all like tofu, which, let's face it, has a serious consistency issue and no flavor when it's by itself. But silken tofu adds an interesting consistency and slightly nutty flavor to fruit smoothies. In hot and sour soup, the tofu takes on the lovely tangy flavors of the broth. And I love a good stir-fried tofu when it's crispy outside and silky inside, like the Coconut Curry Vegetables or Vegetarian Ma Po Tofu from P. F. Chang's China Bistro.

My question to you: Tofu or not tofu?

My First Short Story (1st 1st)

Stephanie over at Cool People I Know (whom I found via Jen Lemen) has tagged her readers to jump in on her meme and provide a list of five firsts. Read the others here.

Here's my first first: My First Short Story.

Drawn when I was just a few months shy of six years old, my first short story featured a man-eating dinosaur, weird weather, a wonky-shaped house, and two little boys. Here are the pictures, accompanied by the descriptions I told my mom, which I took from the journal she kept.

September 27, 1981
Jenny drew these pictures and put the book together by herself. The following is what she said the story is.

Page 1: Person is afraid of the dinosaur.

Page 2: Now the dinosaur is eating the person.

Page 3: This is the little boy's brother. He is digging in the sand. It is sunny and suddenly it starts to rain. He is sad because the dinosaur ate his brother.

Page 4: Mother and Father are sad at home because their child is gone.

Page 5: Boy in dinosaur's stomach. Little boy is sad. The other things in dinosaur are bones.

Page 6: Boy got out of dinosaur and is happy. Dinosaur is sad and lost his appetite.

I have no idea why I wrote about a dinosaur eating a little boy on the beach. My interest in dinosaurs never really developed, but I am quite fond of the seashore. I wonder if I was worried about the safety of my little brother, who would have been two years old at the time. I came a long way from my initial disappointment and indifference when he first wrecked my only-child status. Here's an excerpt from my mom's journal on the day he was born:

October 10, 1979
When Denny told Jenny that she had a baby brother, she cried and said, "I wanted a baby sister, not a brother." In about half an hour she changed her mind and said a baby brother is O.K.

More firsts to come.

What are some of yours?