Let me tell you a funny story today. Brace yourself, for I am not a great joke-teller. Names have been changed to protect the innocent (and the guilty.)

My mom was visiting in May, and I had a womanSong practice just before a concert.  Mom was not going to be staying long enough to see the performance, so she came along with me to the practice.  We met my friends, Bev and Sheila, to carpool.

Bev had a sweet ride. It was a luxurious Mercedes SUV, which she had been driving for just a few weeks.  The rich, light beige color screamed understated wealth, and the seats inside were leather. The cavernous interior afforded all four of us the room to spread out and slump as we wished. We were oohing and aahing at the sleek touchscreen panel and all the bells and whistles as we rode along.  Then, of course, conversation moved on to other subjects and fun chit chat. We had dinner together at a restaurant, and we all enjoyed the food, as we always do.  Then, we drove a few blocks to the practice session at a large church in the heart of the city, not our normal practice venue. Mom enjoyed the pre-performance so much. I had a tiny solo, so she made sure she took some video.  We usually have two-hour practices, and this was no exception. 

Finally, we headed out of the building to go home.  It was after eight o’clock, and we still had some daylight, though the sky was beginning to dim.  Mom and I followed Bev and Sheila out to the parking lot in single file, like little ducklings, or lemmings.  Bev grabbed her key fob and clicked. Then, she looked puzzled.  The brand-new luxurious SUV was not responding.  This was a conundrum. We couldn’t get the doors unlocked to make the long trek home, and it was getting darker by the minute.  Some of our songbird friends walked by and tried to help, but looked just as puzzled as Bev, who was beginning to look a little frazzled.  I am sure she was thinking she had offered to drive us all to practice and now could not shoulder the responsibility of getting us home. The malfunction was unsettling.  Technology is great when it works.

I do not believe I am any more mechanically inclined than Bev, but I offered my help and inspected the fob as Bev called her husband, Leonard.  He took us through the steps to open the key fob, which would, in an emergency, open the vehicle.  The door handle needed to pop off at a point where the emergency key could be inserted.  We successfully popped off the handle and inserted the key.  It went in, but unmagically stayed in the up-and-down position.  We tried to turn the lock, but to no avail.  All the while, Leonard was on the phone with us, coaching Bev and being as supportive as a husband could be under these circumstances. He suggested calling Mercedes. He was 50 miles away and would be willing to retrieve us all from Charleston should the need arise.  Bev found the information on her phone and hung up with Leonard to contact a Mercedes representative.  

About twenty minutes had passed, and we were no closer to getting into our ride.  The Mercedes representative was calm and collected, and very polite.  Her smooth, trained voice felt like soothing salve. Bev kept the conversation on speaker as she explained the situation.  For identification, Bev had to give them pertinent personal information so that Mercedes would help her to break into her own vehicle. At last, the representative conceded and pinged the omnipotent satellite, orbiting the earth silently above us, like Big Brother.

By this time, I had contacted our song director, Jeanna, who was just about to reach the interstate on her way home to our rural county.  She graciously heeded my plea and turned around in an effort to assuage our anxiety and take us all home in her Toyota.  Bev was making no headway with Mercedes.  The representative had repeatedly and unsuccessfully attempted to unlock the car from outer space.  As Jeanna pulled into the parking lot, she began shuffling items into the trunk of her vehicle so that she could fit all five of us inside. A good thirty minutes had passed at this point, and we were all taken aback by the situation, each swearing a silent oath to avoid products made by Mercedes. Bev and the representative were at an impasse. The satellite was pinged and pinged again to no avail, and the key was still not doing a darn thing.

The church building was all but empty. Our group was about to give up and hop into Jeanna’s smaller, more modest SUV. Squishing would have to be an option. The last two occupants of the church made their way out.  The two men were familiar to us as one was a fellow Jefferson Countian, an auspicious community leader (Bill), and the other was the director of the choral group with which we were invited to perform.  Each of them came out with boxes and bags of sheet music and other sundry items in hand.  As Bill came across the scene, he nodded to everyone, shifted his box a little with his hands, and the BACK OF THE MERCEDES MAGICALLY OPENED.

In less than half a second, my brain was correlating the information, why did this happen??  How??? And then the lightbulb came on. I exclaimed, “Bill, is this your car?”  He nodded and answered, “Yes.”  I am sure he was really befuddled as to why all these women were surrounding his vehicle as if waiting for a ride home…  Perhaps they were all admiring his new purchase.

Bev looked shocked, and then crestfallen, for we had apparently conspired together to break into Bill’s vehicle, identical to hers, and had masterminded the dismantling of the door as well. Laughably, she stood in front of Bill holding her phone and her key fob in one hand and Bill’s vehicle-free metal handle in the other.  We all gasped as we waited to see Bill’s reaction. Bev’s phone conversation with Mercedes was not yet concluded.  Without blinking once, Bev half-whispered into the phone, “It worked, thank you very much.” Click.

Bev is not faint-hearted, and after the initial shock, she walked toward Bill and asked, “Did you just buy this? I have one just like it and had no idea someone else had the same one.  I am afraid I thought this was mine!”  Bev is a great schmoozer. Before she could hand him the piece so rudely wrested from his SUV, we turned and popped it back onto the doorframe.  Luckily, it did not seem any worse for the wear, and there were no visible criminal marks on the paint job.  Bill seemed unfazed, unangered, and accepted the mistake.  Bev continued to talk with Bill, apologizing earnestly.  The rest of us couldn’t help but have a good laugh at our idiocy.  We had all followed Bev into the parking lot without a second thought, not remembering we had parked around the corner of the building where, at this moment, her luxury SUV was very likely parked and successfully unlocked five times by Big Brother Satellite.

The end of the story is simply this: Mom was thoroughly impressed with my friends. We left our victim in the parking lot with his vandalized luxury SUV, walked fifty paces, turned the corner, stepped into Bev’s open vehicle, and drove into the night, like Batman, or Thelma and Louise but without the confusing and depressing ending. Our girls’ night out is every Tuesday if you dare to join us. But please be aware, we are a very naughty bunch.