Worst Moments - worst day

[Carol R. Beigel]

This surely won't top anyone else's worst moment, but I'm sure everyone has
had a day like this one!  I was working in the Dupont Circle neighborhood of
D.C. (no parking) and my job that day was to take apart a Steinway studio so
it could be moved up a small spiral stair case to the second floor of a
townhouse.  I removed the action, keys, case parts and all the screws.
Still the keybed would not come out, so I had to use a chisel to remove the
side pieces.  This was nerve wracking work as it was, as no marks could be
made to the finish.  Finally the keybed came crashing down on my feet!  The
piano movers were late arriving, so I decided to take a quick lunch break,
and proceeded to take the two heavy tool boxes back out to my car a block
away.  Meanwhile, the piano owner went back to work and locked his house,
promising to return when the piano movers arrrived.

I arrived to where I had parked my car, and no car!  This was back in the
days before cell phones, and also the days when I lived hand-to-mouth with
negative cash flow; depending upon each day's receipts for dinner that
night!  So there I was, no car, two heavy tool boxes, and no money because I
had left my purse in the trunk because I had to carry two heavy tool boxes!
When I called the police, they informed me that my car had not been stolen,
but towed to Georgetown because it was suppposedly parked too close to a
stop sign!

Great. Now I am on the street, no money, two heavy tool boxes, starving half
to death and having need of a bathroom!  My plan was to hail a cab, go to
Georgetown and steal my purse out of my car, take the cab across town to the
traffic adjutication office to pay the parking ticket, then back to
Georgetown to get my car out of  hock!   After about 6 cabs refused to stop
for me, I just sat down on the curb and cried.  Then I realized why.  I am
now on the street with no money,  hungry and exhausted from carrying those
two heavy boxes, in need of a bathroom and now a broken zipper in the front
of my pants so everyone can see I'm walking around in my underwear!

Those of us who have been rescued by grace in such a moments of misery will
be hard-pressed to deny a higher power. Sitting there, so miserable, angry
and weak, I remembered that a newly married couple I tuned for lived nearby.
Somehow, I was able to find their house and they were home.  I was fed,
watered, safety pinned and they called a cab. The driver was kind, waited
while I stole my purse, took me to a bank (because the fines had to be paid
in cash).

Hours later, I returned to the townhouse to reassemble the piano.  The
movers were long gone, and the customer was upset because I was late
returning.  I didn't get the keybed in exactly where it had been, and had to
do quite a bit of action regulating.  After some hours, again Nature called
and this time I thought I was in luck, being in someone's home and all that.
This townhouse was newly remodeled, and the homeowner from somewhere only
his Maker knows, but the facilities in the bathroom were not like anything I
had ever seen.  Its bad enough to be in such need, but to have to make such
decisions quickly - well, I made the wrong one. It took a while, but I did
restore the room to working order!

I was to meet my family at a restaurant that evening.  I was running late
with no way to let them know.  The parking fine and cab fare came to $10
more than what I was paid that day.  I was worried about how all that money
going down the drain was going to go over with my husband; and as I crawled
to the table, exhaused and late, my mother-in-law asked cheerily, "how was
your day?"

Carol Beigel
Greenbelt, Maryland