Student Impact!

Labor Day Weekend, a couple of years ago, (Sunday Morning) 4:30 AM

Monique hears a BOOM that she thinks is a gunshot.

So of course its my job to figure out who is shooting at us!

Then there is a knock on the door. A neighbor says to me, "Hurry they are trying to drive off." I look outside and my van has been pushed about 12 feet forward from where I parked it on the street, almost taking out my mailbox.

I know it’s not a good idea to park on the street. The same kind of thing happened to my neighbor’s car 6 years earlier. But, I got a warning for my "bumper" being over a part of the sidewalk. Never mind all my neighbors cars that I have to jog around at 5:30 in the morning when I am jogging because they are "completely" blocking the sidewalk. That's another story altogether (hey but I'm not bitter.)

I stumble out into the darkness and see two kids staggering around their mustang in the dark picking up pieces of their car. They are trying to gather the evidence and run off before the police come. I started to get angry of the idea that my van had been hit so hard it was pushed 12 feet forward and over the curb. One looks up and I realize he is one of my former studenst! My mood went from anger to concern as I saw blood running down his forehead.

He says "Oh man Mr. Cromis, its you! This isn't your van is it?"

I said, "Well it was, are you ok?"

I then called 911 and every Corinth Cop shows up to my house (that is three by the way at that time of the morning) and the EMTs. They did a field sobriety test on both the kids. I didn't teach the other kid but we knew each other.

Well the cops eventually left the kids on the curb and towed their car away (they did not want to go to the hospital, avoiding a blood test maybe?) I offered the kids a ride. They said they were staying less than a block from me and they really were not in a hurry to explain what happened. It turned out the car belonged to his girlfriend's (the mother of his baby I might add) sister. The next day the true owner of the car turned out to be the girl’s mom. Who had not claimed any of these 20 something aged kids as drivers. She came to our house to try to persuade us to file under our insurance because the driver was homeless and unemployed. I said poor choice letting him drive and filed it under their insurance.

The accident totaled both cars.

Two weeks later I am driving a used minivan compliments of my former student’s girlfriend's mother’s insurance company.

Now that's student impact!