April 2024
In Modesto, there aren’t any physical banks located on the west side of town, west of State Route 99, the Golden State Highway. A freight train line runs roughly parallel to the highway and sometimes long trains pass through Modesto, blocking traffic between the east and west sides of town. When that happens, the only way to get from downtown Modesto to the west side is to use the Needham overpass, which opened in 2004. Alternatively, a driver could take city streets to the Briggsmore-Carpenter overpass which would take about 15 minutes without traffic, stop signs, and traffic signals. Given the usual traffic patterns, such a trip would take at least 20 minutes or more and put one several miles out of the way. And by that time, the train would have already passed through downtown.
The banks and credit unions in Modesto are located downtown and scattered all around the eastern side of town. In any case, ATMs (Automatic Teller Machines) where cash can be withdrawn are all over the city and can be found in stores, gas stations, and even some restaurants.
In 2024 many people didn’t carry cash because they used debit and credit cards to pay for things. On the other hand, paper money sometimes did come in handy, especially when purchasing lottery tickets or things at a garage sale. Some people didn’t carry credit cards and used their phones to make purchases because all that credit card information could be stored in them.
In early April 2024, one of the lottery jackpots was over a billion dollars. I decided to buy some lottery tickets, but I needed cash for the lottery ticket dispensing machine at a nearby supermarket. I found an ATM attached to a nearby bank out on Oakdale Road.
The sky was overcast, its clouds merged into a grim, depressing mass. Similarly, the parking was a flat, dull, gray expanse with a few dandelions defiantly poking up from cracks in the asphalt, reminding me of the ongoing processes of ecological succession.
A beat-up car with different colored body parts, broken fenders, and multiple dents sat about 25 to 30 meters from the ATM. The car sat by itself in front of a large empty storefront that once housed a supermarket. The other cars in the parking lot were farther away, in front of a large drugstore and several other businesses still open in the shopping center.
The lone occupant of the beat-up car watched me as I withdrew money from the ATM. I could feel the hairs rise on the back of my neck. My fight-or-flight instincts kicked in, but there wouldn’t be any flight, since I hobbled around with a bad hip at the time. The person in the car appeared to wear a hat and a heavy coat. I saw smoke drifting from the open windows. I thought he might have been smoking marijuana. It wasn’t; he smoked something more dangerous and unpredictable, a drug called Goofron-63. Later that evening, the news relayed a story about a Modesto man who went berserk in a parking lot.
The newscaster said the suspect rammed his car into several parked cars before crashing into an ATM, the very same ATM I used earlier that afternoon. The crash caused him to be pinned under the steering wheel of his car, but when the police, fire department, and emergency medical personnel showed up to investigate and provide assistance, they found the driver loudly singing “O Happy Day,” the one made popular by the Edwin Hawkins Singers in the late 1960s. But he substituted the word “crappy” for “happy.” The police department spokesperson told reporters that the guy “drove around the parking lot like he was in the demolition derby or something.”
A television news reporter told his audience, “I gotta tell ya, this is going to be an insurance nightmare. Several vehicles were damaged by the suspect, who remains handcuffed to a bed in a local hospital. He’s facing several charges, including possession of a dangerous narcotic.” When the news went to commercial, the station played a few bars of the Edwin Hawkins Singers’ version of “Oh Happy Day.”
A couple of days later the winning numbers for the billion-plus lottery drawing were announced. I won a total of four dollars. Life goes on, right?