So here is the story about how I lost my wallet -
Back around 1987 or 1988 I was teaching the band in South Williamsport. I was dating one of the girls who was my assistant, her name is Denise. So it was Hurricane season and we had experienced a week of rain. The weekend of a contest at Central Dauphin in Harrisburg there was more rain - we practiced on a soggy field - cleaned up and headed south for the contest. By the time we arrived it was raining quite hard. The contest was moved indoors to a standstill. I had heard on the radio on the way down that they expected the Susquehanna River to flood in certain spots. One of the spots was the way we had to return to South Williamsport. As soon as the contest was over we headed out. I was driving a nice rental car - I had rented in Phoenixville. Denise and another staff member were in the car with me. I was ahead of the buses on Route 15. I knew that we were riding along the river and was concerned, I mean I was in a rental car and did not want anything to happen to the car. As I was driving along I saw flashing lights a head of us. I was quite concerned and it was pouring quite hard. I asked Denise what I should do - as in take a chance and hit where the river was over the road or turn into the median and cross to head back to go another way. We voted - I was to turn.
I turned into the media and suddenly a wave broke over the hood of the car - I tried to back out immediately but the car stalled out as there was a lot of water in the median. See the median looked like it was straight across and the water was running through (a bit like a river) - I did not realize the media was actually a very deep V shape. So as we sat in the car - it slowly started to take on water. As the car slowly sank into the median, the three us eventually, having crawled into the back seat, decided we needed to crawl out onto the roof of the car.
It was still raining quite hard and people were riding by asking what happened - I told them I was an asshole - I also asked about getting police to come and help us. Eventually the police did come - but we could not walk off the car to the side of the road because the water was moving so fast around the car it would not have been safe. Eventually a tow truck came and pulled the car onto the side of the road after we crawled from the car - across the tow - onto the truck. I had to pay the tow truck driver for towing us.
While all of this was going on - the busses had passed the students were crying because they thought we had an accident. The band director came over and tried to help us out too - and he was able to let the parents know that we were all ok to calm the kids down. The three of us were soaked - thankfully I had my practice clothes in a bag so I changed in the back of one of the busses while the guys in the band held up blankets for me!
After multiple detours we arrived home about 3 AM. When I got up in the morning I needed to make arrangements to get home. I went for my wallet and it was gone. The band director (I stayed with him on the weekends I was there) - drove me back to where the car was and we spent hours looking for my wallet in the debris. No wallet - canceled everything (this was right about the time of ATM cards came out and had no way of getting money without the card)
I got home - told the car agency that it was an active God that the car flooded and took off out of there before they charged me anything.
I rented a car again to drive up again the next weekend. Their football game Friday night was up in Troy so it was quite late until they arrived home. I was waiting in the parking lot for the busses to arrive back from the game. When they did arrive home, the band director got off the first bus and said something like - Oh boy you are gonna love Denise - she has some news for you - he said it quite sarcastically so I was worried. She got off the bus and started to “him and haw” around - when she finally pulled my wallet out of her pocket! It had been in her band jacket since I paid the tow truck man. She just forgot that she put it there - and when I had called her the morning after and she said she had no idea where it was - in all the confusion she had forgotten.
The pay off to this story was - Williamsport was not a very big place. I had a band jacket with my name on it and that I was the color guard director. Almost every place I went the next two weeks in the community people seemed to have known the story of the guy who drove into the median strip!!! The joke was - I had gone water skiing often up in Williamsport during band camp - so I apparently wanted to go water skiing that night! So the night of the South Williamsport band competition - when their band came onto the field - I walked onto the field with a life vest carrying a water ski - the stadium erupted in laugher and applause - Every so often I am reminded of this night!!!
Sorry this was a long one - but it would be hard to explain and have it make sense without the details!!!
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