I am curious as to what someone would think if they heard that there had been an incident involving a knife at a gas station in Los Angeles shortly after midnight. Would they suspect that something bad had happened? Would they believe it must have been a dangerous situation that required police intervention? Or would they think that whatever occurred was either entertaining or no cause for alarm at all?
I would wager that the majority of people assume that something bad had happened. Something so terrible in fact, that at least one person was seriously injured.
Now, here is the story that goes with that title:
I was in Los Angeles and had to drive to Orange County. It was in the middle of the night and my car was almost out of gas. I pulled into the first available gas station. I was all by myself.
It was quite unfortunate that it was so late at night. That meant there weren’t many people around. And the fact that I was alone didn’t help either. Because as it so happens, I needed another pair of hands.
The latch to open the little door covering the gas cap was broken. To open the door, one person had to pull and hold the lever that released the latch. At the same time, another person had to open the gas tank door. This required two people because the lever was in the driver’s compartment, while the gas cap was at the back of the car. The two were too far apart for one person to reach them both. To make matters worse, even with the latch released, the gas tank door wouldn’t just give way. One needed to slide a thin, unbreakable object under the door to pry it open. I had such an object with me in the car. It was a knife.
There were only two other cars at the gas station. One was unoccupied, and from the other emerged a tall, very well-built man in his thirties.
Without thinking twice, I walked over to him and asked him if he could help me. He seemed leery when I explained the situation, but he nodded and followed me to my car.
For obvious reasons I wanted him to be the one pulling the lever while I opened the gas tank door with the knife, but before I could say anything, he was already at the back of the car trying to open the gas cap door. However, without a tool the door wouldn’t budge. And so I pulled out the knife from the glove compartment and handed it to him …
At midnight in Los Angeles at a pretty much deserted gas station, I handed a stranger a knife. And he took it.
When I bent down and pulled the lever, he slid the blade under the gas tank door and successfully pried it open. Then he gave the knife back to me.
I filled up my car and hit the road.
End of story.
There is a saying in monasteries: “Watch your mind.” The monks use this phrase to alert each other when their minds are playing tricks on them. I wouldn’t be surprised if the same thing happens when reading: “Midnight, Los Angeles, a gas station, and a knife” – words that have the power to send one’s mind down a rabbit hole.
Brigitte K. Schneider
aka Ms. Whatcha Think?
Copyright © 2022, Brigitte K. Schneider. If you wish to quote text from this article contact the author by leaving a comment.
