Faith no more? No, not hardly!

On December 26th, while in Florida, I came down with a cold. For the record, I blame the hacking small child that sat next to Sheryl on the flight down. As is customary for me, this thing then went to my sinuses and I developed a nasty infection.

Yes, I know, poor me. I'm not trolling for sympathy, I might add. Merely presenting an applicable back story.

Just a little more than a week ago, I had to go into Toronto for a few meetings and a dental check up and cleaning. Not sure about your dental practitioner’s office, but at mine, it's all about the latest and greatest technology. I believe that I now have to slip into gravity boots and be suspended for a simple cleaning.

So I'm practically upside down in this chair, wearing protective goggles and the hygienist is having a conversation with me. Of course, it is one-sided, but to her, it's a form of social interaction. Personally, I do not believe she gets out much.

That morning I was not feeling too great to begin with. An hour of major sinus/nasal drainage did nothing to make me feel any better. In fact, I now felt quite disgusting and as I drove to my office, felt quite nauseous. Sometimes a steaming mug of hot, strong sweet tea can lift my spirits. Not today. I could not drink it. Lunch came and went – food really had no appeal and I continued to slide into a general feeling of crappiness.

Hours later, things had not changed and I drove home, barely listening to any noise from the radio. All I wanted to do was go home and sleep. After vomiting, of course. As I drove on rural back roads and worked my way through the winter dusk towards a highway, I really started to feel dreadful. I had to pull over. There was only one thing that would offer any relief. I signaled (old habits die hard – I’m sure that the small rodent ahead of me was quite appreciative) and pulled off onto the shoulder. Remember, this was a country road. Snow plows had done a magnificent job of clearing this road and it was groomed meticulously. I put the truck in park and was about to open the door to exit when the right side of the truck suddenly sank in the wink of an eye. The vehicle was now on some awkward angle at the side of the road.

I clambered out. No choice since, as you may recall, I was on a mission. Off to the side I went and as I began to be quite noisily ill, I too sank about 18 inches or so.

It would appear that rural plow operators have no guide markers to advise them what is soft shoulder and what is beyond. In their road clearing endeavours, a wonderfully groomed soft shoulder was presented. Problem was, the last two feet or so of shoulder was, in fact, ditch.

Two calls were then made. One for roadside assistance and the second to TLATO. CAA was much more sympathetic.

As I waited for subscribed assistance to arrive, I was frankly amazed at the number of individuals that stopped to offer comfort, cell phones, a cup of coffee or general support. By this time, it was a cold and clear, very dark night on a rural (paved) road. Yet, still people pulled over. Surprisingly enough, one of the would-be-Samaritans was a young woman.

While physically I felt wretched, my faith in humanity had been restored – at least for that day. The kindness and concern shown by complete strangers was quite touching.

Even as I was tossing my proverbial cookies curbside.