Small Claims Court

I came out of work at Stanford University to discover that my motorcycle had a flat tire. I summoned Danny, my husband at the time, who appeared on his own motorcycle with one of those kits for patching bicycle tires. Motorcycles don't carry spares.

He cobbled the tire together. We knew it wouldn't hold; but after a heart-in-mouth drive down the peninsula on El Camino Real we arrived at Santa Clara Motor Sports, the local BMW motorcycle dealership. As we knew, they weren't open. We left the bike there and called them the next day about the tire and some other minor things it needed.

A week or so later they wanted $300-odd for their efforts. That's in 1974 dollars. We paid up -- what else could we do? -- and then sued them in Small Claims Court. Their head honcho threatened a countersuit. Danny wasn't impressed. I was sure the guy would sue, and that he would win and ruin us. I can't imagine what he would have had against us that he could have made a case of; but at the time I knew nothing about things legal and, as always, assumed the worst. He didn't, of course, have any kind of a case, and he didn't sue.

Danny is a bulldog. He went over every item in the bill, asked questions of motorcycle shops and the local BMW car dealership, even managed to get samples of the kind of seals Santa Clara Motor Sports should have installed instead of the ones they had in fact used. When the time came, we were by far the best-prepared litigants in the courtroom.

We had always been suspicious of the Santa Clara Motor Sports guy, a middle- aged man with a bald head, a skin-deep smile, a habitual demeanor that was meant to express sincerity and didn't, and a talent for running up bills. We took the bike to him because we hadn't been in the neighborhood long and didn't yet know about Rich Davis in San Jose; but that's another story.

When we saw Mr. Motor Sports outside the courtroom that morning, he wasn't smiling. His phony sincerity had given way to what I think was supposed to be an air of quiet menace. He was still bald.

Small Claims Court was an interesting experience. It seemed to be Finance Company Day -- or maybe there are finance companies in court every day. (Do finance companies still exist, or are they deservedly illegal?) One hapless Filipina in a white hospital uniform had been hauled in over a loan she had co-signed for a friend and her boyfriend so they could buy furniture. The payments had not been made and the friend and boyfriend had disappeared, as had the furniture.

The finance company showed minimal interest in their whereabouts. With a solvent victim in their net, they weren't about to concern themselves with the beneficiaries of the furniture.

"Why did you sign this loan?" the judge asked the defendant.

"Because she was my friend." "You know that I have to enforce this?"

"Yes."

Then the judge turned to the woman representing the finance company. I have the impression that judges can get as tired of finance companies as of divorcing fathers who don't want to support their kids.

"I'm continuing this case for two weeks. By that time, I want to see a real effort made to find these people."

I think it was the same finance company lady who had a guy in court for a couple of missed payments. He admitted that he was behind: he'd been sick, or lost his job, or something. He was trying to be conscientious amid his difficulties but didn't think he had missed as many payments as she said.

The judge asked her a few times what the exact amount in dispute was. She went on about the March payment and the April payment and the May payment but seemed unclear on the total.

"How can I issue a judgment if you don't even know how much you're suing for?" asked the judge in exasperation. "Case dismissed!"

When our case came up, dead last, our friend with the bald head tried to make much of the fact that the bike had been found lying on its side, presumably indicating carelessness on our part. The judge accepted our contention that the flattening tire had caused it to tip over. He was impressed enough, particularly by the seals, to award us a small rebate.

Danny was ticked off that it wasn't more. I was content to get anything, and not to be successfully countersued. I pointed out that we had had an interesting experience, which I had to suspect was not novel or interesting to the defendant; and if nothing else, we had tied him up all morning and prevented him from ripping off anyone else.

UPON A SUMMER'S DAY II

God, it was hot. The peaches in the paper bag on the front seat, bought beside the road somewhere, had lost juice and flavor and become mealy and uninteresting. In the absence of air conditioning -- not standard in the summer of 1971, especially in older cars, which this was -- the three of us draped ourselves out the open windows. The air was as desiccated as anything else on that August day north of San Francisco; but at least it was moving. Then, on a barely-two-lane road through the hills, traffic ground to a halt and we sat in the sun and toasted.

We advanced a few yards -- uphill with the dropoff on our right -- halted, advanced again, halted again, over and over. Clearly, something was obstructing one side of the road ahead. Observing the pattern of stops and starts and the traffic coming the other way, and thinking about it as is my way (not that there was much else to do), I concluded that the obstruction was probably on our side of the road. When I said as much to the two guys in the car, I was greeted with a chorus of "Oh, you're so negative, you're always looking at the worst side of things."

It was too hot to argue. In that time and place a woman who ventured to point out anything to one man, let alone two, could expect to be put firmly in her place by tactics having nothing to do with the merits of her position (in my experience, the East Coast was better in that respect; but that's another story). I mentally shrugged my shoulders and, reflecting that the guys probably knew more about traffic patterns than I did, receded and went back to enjoying the heat.

In due course we rounded a corner and passed the obstruction: A huge logging truck bearing two or three redwood trunks had failed to negotiate a curve and, half on the road and half off (California never heard of guard rails), was firmly blocking our side of the road.

Nobody said anything about it. The guys probably didn't even remember the mini-conversation of half an hour or so previously, and reminding them would just have annoyed them. But I made a large mental note to the effect that when men make those "Oh, I don't think so" remarks in that conversation-stopping tone, they don't necessarily know anything I don't know.

OUTSIDE THE BOX

Late one night in a remote parking lot in the early 1960s, Sheldon's clunky old American car wouldn't start. The car was equipped with a standard shift, of course. Automatics probably existed when it was built, but they weren't common. For want of a better alternative, Sheldon pushed the car to the top of a gentle declivity at one side of the parking lot, with an eye to clutch-starting it.

It's not difficult to make a car move on the level, but the slightest slope changes everything. It took all Sheldon's early-twenties strength and stamina to push the car to the top. He started it rolling downhill, jumped in, and at the optimum moment -- when the car was rolling just fast enough to have a chance of starting, with still enough hill in front to maintain momentum -- put it in gear and popped the clutch.

The car wasn't buying any. It chugged, spluttered, and shuddered to a stop.

In the absence of any obvious alternative, Sheldon and the car struggled up the hill and rolled down again. Heartbreakingly, the car fumbled and jerked to a halt again.

In those days before cell phones, the option of a tow truck may not have been available, even in the unlikely event that Sheldon was prepared to pay for one. There was nothing for it but to undertake the weary trek up the parking lot yet again. This, Sheldon realized, would have to be the last attempt of this kind; he wouldn't have it in him to push the car up a fourth time.

With a flash of the kind of insight that can come in a desperate corner, Sheldon noticed, or first took seriously, that it was a windy night, and the wind was blowing down the hill. He opened all four doors to catch the wind, and tried again. This time the car chugged, spluttered, spluttered again, and caught. Sheldon was saved.

THE HOUSE OF USHER: Great Was the Fall Thereof

(with apologies to Edgar Allen Poe)

In my late teens, I aspired to produce a cake in the shape of a house. Such a thing is supposed to be assembled out of rectangular sheets of cake, gingerbread or cookie, nailed together at right angles with toothpicks and further glued with frosting. That approach left me entirely cold. I had taken it into my head that I wanted a solid house-shaped cake.

I actually found a pan for producing such a thing at the local hardware store. It was in two pieces, constructed so as to stand on its roof and be filled from the bottom. Such directions as it came with didn't tell me how much batter I should use or how to adjust the cooking time and temperature. With next to no information to go on and with the misplaced confidence of youth, I forged ahead.

Anything that thick baked at the 350o usual for cakes would turn black and crisp on the outside and fill the kitchen with smoke, while retaining a raw liquid center. I set the oven low; but a more serious problem, as it turned out, was that I dramatically misjudged of the amount of batter appropriate to this large and odd-shaped object. Ten minutes after the house-cake went into the oven, the unmistakable odor of burnt cake filled the air as the batter expanded, rose, and overflowed. Knowing better than to open the door on a cake prematurely, I put off the evil moment as long as I could restrain myself.

When I declared that the cake was as done as it was going to be and took it out, batter had spilled all down the sides of the pan and formed big, charred cookies on the bottom of the oven and stalactites dangling from the oven racks. The center of the cake had collapsed into a five-inch Great Depression.

My father, a foodie's foodie, never met a dessert he didn't like. He enjoyed dense, heavy, pudding-y concoctions and actually had a certain fondness for fallen cake -- but even he wouldn't eat this one. The house-cake may have been the only dessert our family ever threw away.

DUCK SOUP

One Sunday in early spring, Mother and I stopped for lunch at the Old Mill in Westminster. A restaurant for many decades now but originally a mill, it is picturesquely situated at the edge of the mill pond. A long porch faces the pond; the walkway into the building and the dining room windows offer views of the brook cascading over the dam and rattling and foaming over the rocks on its way to Fitchburg and points east. Ducks, a few swans, and a passing goose or two thrive on a diet of whatever grows in the pond supplemented by leftover rolls, including the Old Mill's signature pecan rolls, from a basket of discarded baked goods maintained for the purpose. When Justin was six or seven, he was pecked soundly in the foot for not being quick enough in dispensing alms. The Old Mill's birds must be among the world's most prosperous water fowl.

On this Sunday afternoon, the ice on the pond had turned to a slab of slush that looked like ice but wasn't, quite. Our attention was attracted by a duck that, through force of habit reinforced through the winter, began from a floating position near the dam and, with great flapping of wings and (I suppose) stomping and clinging with its feet, attempted to scale the ice floe -- now more of a slush floe. Away from the edges, it was firm enough to hold a number of ducks. At the comparatively thin edges, it gave way steadily before the bird's frantic thrashing and flailing.

Eventually, the duck either caught on and flapped hard enough to raise itself out of the water, or arrived at a thicker place towards the interior of the ice. The last we saw of it, it was sitting on its chilly perch enjoying a well-earned rest.

HOW WE CELEBRATED EASTER

Long before Paula's kids were allowed on the road, they learned to drive in the field behind the house in Otter River. Justin, a dozen years younger than his cousins, watched in fascination. He loved the fact that it's all right for a kid to drive in an eight-acre field that belongs to his family. He sat in my lap to steer until he could reach the pedals and thereafter took the wheel by himself, with me supervising from the passenger seat.

On Easter Sunday when he was eleven, he clamored for a driving lesson after dinner. The holiday at best wasn't all that gladsome at that time: my father's death shortly after Easter half a dozen years before was still on the back of everyone's mind. With nothing festive going on, Justin and I might as well conduct a driving lesson in the field.

Everything was fine until he ventured too far into that low-lying back corner (an outpost of the family Swamp), where the car sank into the mud and stuck there. I took over the driving and did no better. By the time we finished scrubbing and scrabbling around in the mud and moss, the right front bumper was resting on the ground and the left only a few precarious inches above it.

We crossed the field to the house to see what we could do about rounding up help. Paula and Mary rose to the occasion, and off we went across the field in the almost-rain: misting, damp and soggy. As we trooped out there, Mary said in an impatient treble -- this family runs to sopranos -- "Don't you remember Dad telling you, 'It's too wet to drive in the field?'" "No," I snapped, "because I never asked, because I wasn't interested in driving." That's my family: When you get into trouble they'll drop everything and gather to help if they can, and let you know every step of the way just what a stupid thing to do that was.

All four of us together couldn't move the Toyota. This was serious. I had work to do in Medford. I couldn't afford a delay that threatened to extend at least into Monday. I steamed back to the house and called a tow truck.

"Is it solid enough so I can drive out there?" asked the tow truck guy. I assured him that it was, on what grounds I can't imagine. I also, then or later, started researching busses that would get me back to Medford in time to get my work done. There weren't any.

Assuming the car wouldn't be liberated in time to save me, I indulged in a fit of the furious sulks in the unused back parlor. When my mother ventured to make a suggestion, I barked at her and went back to sulking. The first I heard of the arrival of the tow truck was when someone came in to tell me that it, too, was stuck in the family Swamp.

Meanwhile, unknown to me, about the time I called the tow truck, Paula had called her sons. The three of them, in their early twenties at the time, were a decent start on a basketball or football team. She said: "Why weren't you here this morning? You said you were coming to church? Come up here and get your aunt's car out of the mud."

Still sulking and brooding in the back parlor, I didn't see the sons arrive either. I was told later that they began by dislodging the tow truck -- pushed it, I suppose -- and then turned their attention to the Toyota. Mother says they lifted the front end, placed boards under the wheels, and pushed the car out. I never thought until this moment about what Justin was doing all this time; he was probably in the field with his cousins, trying to help and getting wet and muddy.

I'm sorry to say I don't think I thanked my nephews properly. It was Paula who ventured into the back parlor to inform me that my car was now available. I don't remember seeing the guys at all that day.

Justin describes my behavior in a crisis as "running around screaming as if your hair was on fire." I see his point. When I'm tempted to be annoyed with my family, I remind myself of some of the things they've put up with from me.

CONFRONTATION IN THE SUBURBS: IMPATIENCE REWARDED II

One morning on Old Connecticut Path in Wayland between Route 126 and Stonebridge Road, I noticed something erratic in the operation of the two white cars in front of me: their brake lights flashed a nervous rhythm as they sped up for a while, braked suddenly, sped up again, braked again. As we proceeded, I sorted out what was going on: the second car was tailgating the first, and the first driver was flashing the brake lights deliberately to get the second driver to back off.

You can't pass on Old Connecticut Path. I watched these feuding drivers from a safe distance until the inevitable happened: the first driver braked suddenly, the second driver failed to stop in time, and a minor fender-bender resulted. From the first car emerged a tall, dark-haired man who might be in his thirties, shouting something like, "All right, now you've done it!" As I cautiously made my way past the two stopped vehicles, I glanced through the open door at the driver of the second car, a very unhappy-looking middle-aged woman who might have been a secretary, administrative assistant or schoolteacher.

If these cars had been driven by a couple of teenagers or twenty-somethings, I would assume they were just being stupid and hope they'd live to outgrow it. Between two adults, one of them an older woman, I have to think there was more going on here than meets the eye.

Why was this woman so determined to exceed the speed limit on a narrow, winding secondary road? Had she left a flatiron on, or forgotten to pick up a grandchild from school? Had she been summoned from work by a call from an ailing husband, or the fire department? And why, after the collision, was she just sitting in the car looking unhappy, and not yelling back, or at least trying to explain?

What's the man's problem? Would it kill him to pull over and let her pass, instead of deliberately provoking an accident? I remember a guy that I guess I cut off on Soldiers Field Road, who surged past me and then dodged in front of me and slammed on his brakes. It took me a minute or so to figure out that he had done it on purpose to get even. Some people take their cars and driving very seriously and have a mission to punish others for driving they don't approve of. Or maybe Mr. Thirty-Something lives on this road and is really tired of watching people speed past the lawn where his children are playing.

Maybe these two know each other; maybe this is the latest chapter in a decades-long neighborhood feud (I once typed a bunch of documents for a lawsuit involving a forty-year war between neighbors). Maybe she's his mother-in-law, or ex-mother-in-law, or becoming-ex-mother-in-law, tailing him for some reason. Maybe she's somehow protecting her daughter and her grandchildren, or thinks she is.

Of course, I never heard anything more about this incident. I sure would be interested to know what it was all about.