Merry Christmas, Everyone...especially the dingbats of the world! A.K.A. "Stranger Danger"

I'm in Paducah, KY, visiting my sister and her family for Christmas. I love her house, a 80 year-old four-square with a fan-light window over the front door, a 20-step staircase leading up to the second floor, a big, teen-friendly basement, and a finished attic. I also love the family gathering...her kids come in from their respective colleges, my Uncle Albert drives in from Lubbock, TX. She and her husband are always so hospitable.

But, I don't always like to sit around and do nothing... Sister likes to do nothing, since she's been working so hard getting prepared for everyone. Yesterday, I talked her into driving back down I-24 to "Patti's 1880's Settlement." I always see the sign on the freeway for Patti's 1880's Settlement--a brown highway sign. Brown signs always mark some sort of scenic or historical attraction. I love to stop at these types of places, but it's so close to Paducah that I never have stopped--I usually reach Paducah after dark.

Yesterday, we drove over to see what we could see.

Patti's is actually a sort of tourist trap in Grand Rivers, KY. I understand that Patti's has a good restaurant, but it was closed--December 22-25. There were some antique and specialty shops open in Grand Rivers, however, so we had a good time looking around. Then we drove around looking at the sights--Green Turtle Bay Resort, Lighthouse Landing.

As we were leaving, about to turn off the road we were on in order to drive across Kentucky Dam, we saw this woman walking down the road, wearing a thin knit poncho and carrying her purse. I realized that I had seen her earlier in one of the shops we had visited and assumed her car had broken down--why else would she be walking so far outside of town in regular shoes, carrying her purse? I convinced my sister to turn around, go back, and check on her.

This woman, who must of been in her forties or fifties, said that she'd just gone out for a walk while her friends went to Walmart. We offered to give her a ride back to her friends' house. Only she didn't know where it was...

We spent the next forty minutes looking for this house, following her cries of "oh, it must be down this road!" (Nope, dead-end.) "Oh, it's next to a campground." (Oh, not this campground, one that doesn't have trailers, more like a reserve.) "It's just up the road from the boats that are decorated." (Hello? Are we not in the "Land Between the Lakes? WHICH marina do you mean?)

It's nice to be a good Samaritan, but this mission of mercy became much more complicated than I ever imagined. And my poor neice, Emily, who got stuck sitting next to her on the back seat of the SUV, said she smelled "weird." (I think she'd been dabbling in the "Kama Sutra" oils in the shop where I had first noticed her).

I hope that, if I am ever in a similar situtation, lost in a town that I am visiting, some nice person will take mercy on me and help me find my way home. But jeez-louise! I'm not dumb enough to wander TWO MILES outside of town without a map, carrying my purse, NOT in walking shoes.

So, I hope the dingbat is okay. And I really appreciate my sister and family indulging my good Samaritan instincts.

And people wonder where writers get their ideas...All we really have to do is pay attention.