Mom’s in Jail!

Carol, Mom, Fran

It took less than thirty minutes after receiving that phone call from the Cherry Hill Police for all of us kids to gather at the local station.

Mom, then 92 and still very much together, simply worshipped the freedom of her car. It was her mode of transportation for Thursday poker games with the girls. So she was understandably distraught when she peered out the window of her Senior high rise building and realized her prize possession, a 1993 Honda Civic, was missing from her parking spot. She frantically called me. “Why would they take your old car,” I asked. “Oh,” she replied, “I saw on the news they are stealing old cars for the parts.” So I proceeded to fill out a stolen car report.

Mom lived next to a shopping center. We knew she really didn’t need transportation, but as good kids we had to quickly find her another vehicle or we’d never hear the end if she missed her almighty poker game! Our search was on when I got the “police call” only several days later.

“What are the charges?” my son-in-law asked. “Driving a stolen car, no vehicle registration, no insurance, no recent inspection sticker.”   “What car?” I exclaimed astounded by this!

Evidently Mom had walked over to the shopping center and voila, there was her car parked in front of the drug store. Oh now she remembered.

“This is where I parked it the other day because it was so beautiful outside I decided to walk home.” My kids will be so relieved, she thought. She got into her car and just as she exited the lot, the sirens went off. Police were in front and police were in back. She was so scared that she refused to talk.

Guess something good came out of this as we realized she had allowed her registration and insurance to expire. Oh well, she’s just Mom. So no more keys, no more car and we now drive her to the poker game with the girls!