My good friend, Gretchen, is a part of a running club. Actually, they consider themselves a drinking club with a running problem. It’s a worldwide phenomenon called hashing. You run and a “hare” sets up drinking stops along the way. Hashers are a fun, rowdy bunch and they have a lot of special traditions and lingo. Part of the experience is that you’re bestowed with your very own hash name. One day, I asked Gretchen what she thought my name should be and she quickly responded with “Drag Queen.” It took no thought, no effort, no time. I was flabbergasted. I’m certainly no drag queen. If you read my last post, you’ll know that I know nothing about makeup, hairdos, and generally being fabulous. I inquired where this comparison was coming from and she reminded me of my rich history of dragging people with my car. Okay, now it all made sense. Yes, believe it or not, I have dragged, not one, but two people behind my car in my lifetime…and I’m only midlife so I might just be warming up.
My first victim was my boyfriend. Or at least, I should say, for accuracy, my boyfriend at the time. Now, he’s my forever friend, which may shock you by the end of this. Anyhow, I was dropping him off at his workplace so that he could pick up his vehicle and then join me at our apartment soon after. He was fiddled around in the trunk of my Jeep for a second and then closed the back hatch. Once the hatch was closed, I sped off. A couple minutes later, he caught up with me by nearly running me off the road. Once I was pulled over, he got out of the car and began cursing and flailing his arms around at me. In my complete confusion about why he was so pissed, I could see his car slowly rolling into a ditch. I made him aware of his runaway vehicle and sped off home, completely perturbed. I mean, one second we were on great terms and the next he’s got road rage.
So after collecting himself by wrangling his vehicle, he calmly came home and told me what had happened. You see, I had a boat, and I wish the story just stopped there but it didn’t. When he was fiddling around in the back of my Jeep, the wiring harness to the boat trailer was just long enough to loop around his ankle. Once I hit the gas, he was thrown to the ground and dragged around the parking lot. Thank god the parking lot was sizeable because he had just enough time to free himself. He said that he knew as soon as I turned on to the main road that he would be a goner. I felt awful (still do). It took all the strength that he could muster but he got loose and immediately jumped into the car to yell at me, which was well deserved after what I’d just done. To add insult to injury, he was so overcome with emotion when he caught up with me that he forgot to put his car into gear. Thus, the runaway vehicle.
The next day, he came into work to find his coworkers having a laugh while watching the security camera footage of him frantically clinging to life behind my Jeep. If I remember correctly, I think his pants even came down or were torn off during the dragging process. For weeks after, he was still finding random change and goodies that he’d lost from his pockets strewn about the parking lot.
The second time was just a mess of an experience that I barely understand to this day. It started at the glorious Tap NY Brew Fest. I was the designated driver for my two friends and their two friends…so basically I drove two couples. To be clear, one couple I was friends with and the second were strangers until that day. All was going great at the festival so we decided to go out to a bar afterwards. I was happily mingling and nibbling on some charcuterie when one of my friends came up to me in a panic and told me to get my car STAT and they’ll meet me out front. I understood the assignment and did what I was told. All four of them frantically jumped into my car and were screaming at me to GO! GOOOOOO! No sooner did I floor it, l looked into my rearview mirror to see an angry mob pouring out of the bar coming at us. As I glanced back, I also noticed that one passenger was not completely in the car, like not in the car at all. I had a dangler. Her body was completely outside the vehicle and her partner had her by the laces of one sneaker! I slowed down once I saw her and everyone, including her and her partner were motioning me to GO! GOOOOOOO! Yes, she was dangling from a vehicle, by a shoelace, waving at me to speed up with one hand and trying to grab hold of the door frame with the other. Yes, I know, I wouldn’t have believed such an impressive display of human strength and coordination was possible either if I hadn’t seen it myself.
A few blocks later, when everyone was 100% in the vehicle and calmer, I was pulled over…as I should have been. The police officer had been receiving calls about someone being dragged down Main Street in a speeding vehicle and there I was, just casually passing him in the getaway car. How very convenient.
My friends and I ended up having to go back to the station to explain it all. Come to find out, one of the people that I’d spent the day with (one member of the couple that I didn’t know and the person who just so happened to be the “dangler”) ended up starting a bar fight. She was a very masculine looking lesbian and when she got drunk, if people accidently misgendered her, she’d instantly fly off the handle. Well, that happened in a very packed bar full of people who’d been at a beer fest all day. I can’t remember if it was the bartender or the actual owner who accidently said “sir” to her but that was enough….fists were flying before anyone knew what was happening. Everyone came to the bartender/owner’s aide and a mob scene was born. I was in a completely different room at the time, jam packed with people and loud music so I had no idea what was happening. That’s when my friend came running in and told me to get the car.
I ended up in the police station, having just dragged a person down Main Street, and I had no idea how such a perfect day could go sideways so quickly. The police let me go because I hadn’t been drinking and I was completely, utterly confused by my circumstances. I was just swept up in a whirlwind. They ended up keeping the girl overnight. She did not get off scott-free, like I had. After all was said and done, I believe that she was forced into an anger management program.
When the police were finished with me, I got a lift home from one of the officers. At the time, I lived with 3.5 other people in a converted hay barn on a historic farm in the Hudson Valley. It just so happened that my housemates were having a party on the deck and I was considered fashionably late. The driveway was a quarter of a mile long and the entire party had a nice long look at a cop car rolling up on their shenanigans. Hah! What an absolute legend!
So yes, I have officially dragged two people. Perhaps Gretchen is right and I am a drag queen after all. The name fits. I know, I know, it’s nothing to brag about. This is some life and death shit here. Thankfully, no one was hurt besides a few bruises, lost change, and pride.
The Unmaker 