Mother Theresa?

I wanted to cut my hair, but no-one would, I dont know why everyone thinks its great to have long hair. Its ok, but so is short hair ( which I usually have more often than long and I love!). Anyway, that's how I ended up back in Baton Rouge, Louisiana from Columbus, Ohio with my raggedy hair, and spending like two hours everyday for a week to decide how I was going to style this funky head of mine. I finally settled on being pulled and dragged for about 2hours to get it looking presentable and that's how I came to meet her. 

She came in a green Honda that was missing the back bumper and dragging her 6year old daughter with her and so I was already sympathetic, any woman trying to make it through in life has my sympathy and help whether they ask for it or no. She did her work diligently and kept her daughter on a short leash, while I tried to encourage her to let her child be. That's why kids like me, I take their side against parents/authority because I still see myself as a child and wish that most parents would take a chill-pill from time to time. Also, she played music on her phone while she worked and anyone who can like Tupac and Luther Vandross has my friendship. I think those two rocked like crazy and I told her so. 

Now as is usual with me, I had no money on me when she finished and had to go to the store to get some to pay her and so I asked to be excused to go into my room to get dressed to step outside in the 60something degree weather......What?! I am tropical! I like 30degrees and that is in celsius as against the farenheit you temperate ones are used to! And so I come out of my room and find that she had left to go start her car, which is fine, that's also something I dont understand, I can jump in and go but apparently here, you have to coax and beg your car and be very polite or you will be catching the bus real quick. We went to the nearest store and I got the money (please, dont let me think of how much it was and how much that is in naira,please!). 

So, we drive back to my apartment complex and I get a call from my flatmate saying her laptop which she had left on the table in the living area and which I had seen and this lady and her daughter had seen (in fact as soon as they entered, her daughter had made a bee-line for it and I had asked her to not touch it as it wasnt mine) was missing. Now, we had been out of the apartment for like 15minutes so there was no way someone could have come in and taken it in that time except that person was already inside or had a key. So naturally, I turned to my 'hairdresser' and ask if she had taken the laptop, and she says no and I turn to her daughter and ask if she took it and placed it somewhere else and she says no. 

Here, my catalogue of mistakes take on a life of their own. I step out of the car and ask her to please come in with me to show my flatmate where she had last seen the laptop. What foolish belief had I? I went in and was shocked to see a white board I had given her daughter in the place where the computer had sat only minutes before and then, I wondered why she had not come in from the car and went out to look for her but she must have been laughing at how foolish I had been. She was gone!

Already at this point, it was a pretty bizarre story (for me!) but like they say on reality tv, watch what happens next. Eager to test the veracity of the efficacy of American Police and contrast with Nigerian Police, I asked the owner to call 911. About an hour later, 2 Policemen show up and ask us questions about what happened. We gave all the details we knew and they left asking us to contact them if we had further information. I was mad, very mad, I could not believe that a person would do that and especially with her daughter in attendance and again, I felt she was jeopardizing her children (she had told me she had four children and had even showed me a video of them playing at her mum's) because she would be caught and sent to jail and those kids would end up in a system that scares me more than anything else in America-the foster care system. 

Anyway, I called and called her phone and got no response at any time, and it was only then that I believed she must have taken it. So I asked my boss (and I meant the Big G) and proceeded cautiously. I called and left the first voicemail advising her to return the laptop, no response. The next day,(yesterday)I called and counselled her to return the laptop cos the Police had her contact details and name and it would be a question of time before they caught her, no response, or so I thought. 

Woke up in a funk today and stayed home, getting ready to go out at about noon, I came in from the bath and realised I had missed her call and I quickly called her back. As soon as she picked up the phone, she said,'its in the leasing office of your apartment complex'. For the life of me, I could not wrap my head around it and asked her to repeat herself 3 times before the light bulb in my head came on! Dropping my phone, I ran from my room to the office and forshure, there it was! I picked it up after listening to all the bullcrap she had told them in there about me losing it on the bus and she had found it for me and wanted to return it. I was just very grateful and thankful and I truly was blown away by the fact that she actually did return it. 

Next kicked in my Mother Theresa mode.....the need to rehabilitate her, I sent her a text asking for a firm promise that she would never do anything that would put her children at risk like that again and I got a terse 'ok' in response. I am thinking she ought to face the consequences of her actions but will be asking for a light sentence of perhaps community service or such like rather than asking for the case to be dropped entirely. A friend thinks I may have found a new 'project' and he may be right. I believe she needs help and if I am the one to give it, well, so be it but if I am not, I want to have her squarely on the path to meet the one who is.......