I was asleep but felt stressed so here I am writing at 11pm on my blog.
I live in low income housing. Everyone who has a unit in the apartment complex where I do struggles to some extent with their mental health (me included). That’s how the property and property management designed the complex and picked us tenants.
Police being called to the apartments is not uncommon. Earlier today an ambulance was called to the apartments. I genuinely care about my neighbors, even the ones I don’t speak to anymore. I wish them health and peace and that they are able to stay sober.
I saw which apartment the ambulance pulled up to and from prior ambulance visits I guessed who the paramedic’s were checking on. I didn’t stop cooking or go out and ask anyone anything. The scene is common where I live and confirming who the paramedic’s were helping didn’t make sense.
Later in the afternoon a drunk man I recognize was visiting a tenant at the apartment when he got angry, mad, belligerent and took someone’s walker and destroyed it kicking it down the street. Several hours later he came back still drunk and mad and started to destroy a patio chair outside one apartment, yelling nonsense the whole time.
I called 911 as he walked away and reported the incident. I got a call from a Police Officer soon after. They had the man in custody and asked if anyone wanted to be the “victim” in order to press charges. Now I was involved. The property that was damaged wasn’t mine. I knocked on the neighbors door and said I had the Police on the phone and asked if anyone wanted to press charges. It turns out that the walker that was damaged was not the good walker and no one wanted to press charges.
I went to the other apartment and looked at the patio chair that the culprit tried to damage and after looking close, the chair had taken a beating without any damage that I could see.
I told the Police Officer no-one wanted to press charges and that he disturbed the peace and was drunk. The Officer confirmed my name and I thanked him. That was it. It is illegal to be drunk in public and a disorderly, nuisance. I don’t know what happened to the culprit, hopefully he doesn’t come back.
That’s not why I woke up. The incident regarding the drunk man who damaged a cheap walker was handled to my satisfaction.
I think I woke up because of something that happened at work yesterday. I was working for the temp to hire employment staffing agency scheduled as a driver for a rental car company. I was hired to drive a rental car from Medford to the Eugene Airport and then ride back in a van with the other drivers to Medford.
Once each driver had arrived at our meetup location at Eugene Airport and all the rental cars had been delivered we waited for two vans to be prepared for us to ride back to Medford in.
A temp to hire employee who had driven from Medford to Eugene Airport in a rental car was chosen to drive one van of passengers to Medford. I rode in the van the temp to hire employee was chosen to drive. A manager with the rental car company drove the other van with passengers to Medford.
The ride back was mostly uneventful and smooth but not 100% and that’s why I’m writing this post. I don’t expect a driver to be the very best driver on the road, but I do expect the driver to be safe and courteous. On the drive to Medford I was one of three passengers who sat on the row of seats directly behind the driver and the passenger in front. There were 11 of us total in the van including the driver.
The max speed limit was 65mph. I couldn’t clearly see the speedometer from the passenger row where I was seated and don’t know if he drove the speed limit the whole 2 hour and 45 minute drive to Medford. I don’t think he drove too fast. He seemed to be driving mostly at the speed of traffic.
The drive from Eugene to Medford goes through valleys and mountains. Some of the terrain is steep with steep inclines and a steep decent through the mountains.
I noticed several times when the driver was speeding up to pass on the left lane a large semi truck, the semi truck had their left turn blinkers on and the driver of the van followed a car directly ahead of us to pass the semi truck in the right hand lane.
The driver of the van effectively blocked the semi truck from turning on to the left hand lane until we had followed the car in front of us past the semi truck on the right hand lane.
It’s not a driving maneuver I would have chosen to do and it rattled the passenger sitting next to me on the row of seats. I too was nervous that our van would get clipped by the semi truck if the semi truck merged onto the left hand lane.
The diver of the van followed the car in front of us closely so even though the driver of the semi truck had their left turn signals on they didn’t have enough time to turn onto the left lane as the driver in front of us and the van passed the semi truck on the left hand lane.
Another thing happened on the drive to Medford. The driver was talking a lot and listening a lot to the lady on the front passenger seat. They talked so much that the driver seemed to be giving too much attention to the lady sitting on the seat beside him and not enough attention to driving the van.
At one point the driver intentionally swerved a little bit on the highway. It seemed like he intentionally swerved to get attention from the passengers. It was a little nerve racking when he intentionally swerved while driving at about 65mph on the highway.
Another time I would choose to ride with a different driver.
A driver who’s focus was a little more on driving and a little less on the lady sitting next to him. A driver who wouldn’t follow a car too close to pass a semi truck trying to turn onto the lane we were on. A driver who wouldn’t intentionally swerve while driving to get the attention of us passengers.
We arrived from Eugene Airport in Medford at the rental car office safe.
Interest or not 
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