Cameron's Imagination

I had quite an interesting experience last night that I thought I ought to share on the blog.
We have been running a little behind on the cap-lining machine so I said I would come in and finish the job they were working on last night.
Normally when I come in to work at night it is really quiet and there is no one ever around. Our building is somewhat secluded. There really is nothing for a mile North of us and to the South about a mile is Rosepark (not a very nice neighborhood if you know Salt Lake at all). Anyway, I pull up to the building at about 10:45pm and there is an old red Toyota Corolla parked in front of our building (our doors are on the back side of the building out of view from Redwood Road). I thought it somewhat strange because no one is ever around at night and I didn’t recognize the car. I went in to my building to get a drink from the pop machine and walking back to the Lining building I stopped to turn on the air compressor. Then walking over to the door I looked at the mysterious car again and realized it was left completely unlocked, a big no-no in this neighborhood. The car also had no license plates. I called Kerry (Dad’s business partner) and told him what was going on and that I was going to call the police. He was freaking out telling me just to leave (because that’s what he said he would do). I decided to just pull my car into the warehouse and lock myself in while I called the police. It’s now 11:00pm, I’m alone in a warehouse, it’s dead quiet and I didn’t want to turn the radio or anything on because it might give it away that I’m in there. Picture yourselves, or even more comical picture me in a warehouse under these circumstances and tell me whether or not your imagination might start to run away a little. Let me answer that, yes your imagination would run and fast too. So, back to the dead silence, I’m waiting for the cop to show up and I gave them my cell phone# so they could call me when he showed up so I wouldn’t have to open the door unless I knew who was out there. In the silence one of the fluorescent light bulbs above my head started to buzz. It started so fast that jumped out of my skin to hang in the rafters. OK, not really but it really did scare me. So here I am hearing things (example: doors closing), I now have a 3’ steel pipe in hand which I had wrapped duct tape around the base for better grip and I’m pacing the warehouse. I sneak out the side door and peak around the building and the car is still there and no one in sight. I hurry back inside my mind the whole time going through the thousands of scenarios that may lay ahead, guns, knives, and me disarming a whole gang with my steel pipe, etc. (didn’t I tell you my imagination was running away). I go back in the warehouse and again wait in the silence. 11:30pm, this time I know I heard something outside. A car door slamming and voices. Again, I sneak out the side door, quietly walk to the corner of the building and peak around. This time there was someone there, bright lights and someone in the mysterious car! It only took a minute for my mind to register the bright lights was from a cop car and the person in the Corolla was the cop. I start to walk out to him when the thought crosses my mind, “what is this cop going to do when he sees a man walking out of the shadows in this neighborhood with a 3’ steel pipe in hand?” The vision of getting shot was too much so I threw the pipe in the bushes and then walked out. Sure enough, the minute he saw me his hand went slowly to his holster. I put my hands up a little and gave him my name and told him that I worked here and I am the one who called the police. He approached me and shook my hand. Just then his radio came back with the report that this car had been stolen over a week ago. While they were trying to contact the owner this officer took all of my information. He then started to go through the car a little and found quite a bit of blood on the dash and the ceiling. His dispatcher wasn’t able to contact the owner so they called a tow truck to come impound the car. I told the officer that I had some work I could do if he thought it was ok to stay around. He suggested that I go home for the night. “We don’t know when the car was left so we don’t know where the thief is or if he has any intentions to hurt or steel again.” He waited for the tow truck and walked around the buildings making sure that they all were secure and that there was no sign of break-ins. I of course had no objections to getting the heck out of there, especially after he put it that way.

I’m just glad I was here and not in Vegas. After our experience with the cops in Vegas last month I would have been dead in a warehouse and the cops would have refused to come out because it was too far. Seriously though, I was glad that an officer responded as fast as he did last night. If nothing else it calmed my imagination and gave me a little peace of mind to drive home with. It also gave me more appreciation for what they do. He was going to wander around the buildings by himself with the same uncertainties that he just warned me about.

Sorry about the novel and I hope it made some sense.
Blog ya’ll later!

Cameron