I had been working a swing shift, so I drove home in the dark. I was really late and I was really tired. I don’t envy the people who share a highway with me on nights such as these. My car has been “self-driving” for years.
After 25 miles of slapping myself in the face to stay awake, I finally made it home. I pulled into the driveway, and my headlights illuminated the dark yard. That’s when I saw it.
There was a thing in the yard. Right in the middle of a smooth expanse of grass. I’m used to having wild rabbits greet me as we live next to a 130 acre park, but this was definitely not one of those.
This thing looked like a half sphere in the grass. It was white, and had creepy ridges along its surface. And was it just my headlights, or was it glowing?
I sat in my car and stared at it for a long time. I was waiting for it to move. Was it alive? If so, what was it? An albino turtle? A gigantic and fast growing mushroom? Some kind of weird alien goo?
I would have to pass by this thing to get into the house. Would it attack me? Still no signs of movement. But maybe it was waiting to strike. Or spring. Or fly into my hair. Ugh.
I rolled down my window slightly to check for noises. It wasn’t growling. That’s good. But it also wasn’t purring. Maybe it was deep in thought. Plotting.
But it still hadn’t moved at all, and I began to wonder if it was, in fact, inanimate. What if it was an oddly ridged skull? Oh crap. I’d rather it was an animal waiting to pounce.
Eventually, due to sheer exhaustion, I decided to leave the safety of my car and make a mad dash to the house. And of course it had to be one of those nights when I fumbled with my keys, expecting something heavy to land on my shoulders the entire time.
I got in the house, slammed the door, and leaned back against it with relief. My husband was looking at me quizzically.
“Uh… there’s this… thing in the yard…”
“Oh, yeah!” he said, looking quite pleased with himself. “That’s that cabbage we bought and never used. I was thinking maybe the rabbits might like it.”
“Holy screamin’ cats! You could warn a person! I thought it was a freakin’ alien from outer space!”
The next night, before I even started my commute home, I texted my husband. “Should I anticipate any errant produce in the yard?”
“Not tonight,” he said.
Like the way my weird mind works? Then you’ll enjoy my book! http://amzn.to/2mlPVh5
The View from a Drawbridge 
…But hey, at least you got a good story out of it!
Much of life becomes blog fodder for me. 🙂
This reminds me of the time I came home at dark thirty, totally exhausted, and there was something moving erratically but slowly in the yard. After several minutes of fear, I called my husband to bring out the gun and find out what it was.
LOL! He had bought a robot lawnmower, (like a Roomba). and didn’t want to wait for daylight to see if it worked.
It did. Luckily my heart survived.
ROFL. That definitely tops a cabbage!