Restoring my faith

I stopped into a local Walmart yesterday afternoon to make a return.  There was a rather long line, and it took about 20 minutes.  As I approached my car in the parking lot, I noticed that someone had hit the driver's-side front quarter panel, bending it, leaving streaks of white and gouges with black paint in them.

Looks just like Trixie before her boo-boo.

Trixie (yes, I've named my car...she's a girly-girl with long black eyelashes) is the first car I ever bought outright with cash.  She's in immaculate shape, has low mileage (as far as Hondas are concerned), and I'm so proud to drive her around town.  She's a symbol of a wonderful and prosperous chapter of my life.

At first, my heart sank.   I looked on the windshield to see if the culprit had left me a note, but there was nothing there.  I took some pictures of the damage since the light was good.  I felt like I would cry. 

Why didn't that person who did the damage leave information and an apology...or come into the store to have me paged so we could exchange information?  That's what I would do.  I entertained thoughts of waivering faith in the goodness of the average person...if someone could hit my car and drive away with their conscience intact, then I'm living in a pretty sad world.

My sadness quickly morphed into annoyance and anger.  I approached the front-end supervisor and asked to speak to the head of Security or store manager, so we could at least look at the parking lot videos to see if we could come up with some kind of lead.  Her eyes lit up and said, "Is your car a silver Honda with eyelashes?  Two people witnessed your car being hit.  One of them yelled for the female driver to stop while the other wrote down the license plates and color of the car."

I couldn't believe my ears.  This kind of stuff never happens to me.  I'm usually the one being a responsible citizen.

The local police responded immediately.  The officer was polite, respectful and kind, and assured me that the other driver would be liable for the damages, which he estimated to be over $1000.  He invited me to stop at the station this morning to pick up the completed accident report.

According to the report, the 21-year-old daughter of the insured had been driving and considerable damage had been done to the entire right side of her father's car. She was ticketed for driving outside of a lane and leaving the scene of a property damage accident.  I hope these tickets (and consequences from her parents) will teach this young woman about proper social and personal responsibility.

The good citizens who got that vital information didn't leave their names or phone numbers.  I wish they had.  I would thank them profusely to affirm that they had done the right thing.  I'd even offer to take them to dinner.  I really appreciate that they didn't turn their cheek and chose to get involved.  I'd guess they would want someone to do that for them if the shoe was on the other foot.

Mostly, I'm grateful to them for reminding me that there really are good people in the world, and specifically in my neck of the woods.  If you're reading this, thank you from the bottom of my heart.  Trixie thanks you, too.