Have you ever been traveling down the road and see a shoe laying over in the median by itself? One shoe. You have to wonder how that happened…

Was the person who lost the shoe going down the road with their foot hanging out the window? Why didn’t they go back for it? You’d think they might need that shoe when they get where they’re going.

I’ve seen other articles of clothing laying beside the road and wondered if somebody suddenly decided to  stop and have a yard sale right there on the side of the road. I mean, please pick up after yourself! Tennessee trash. Maybe it was somebody taking clothes to the Salvation Army in a convertible…

And how does underwear end up by the roadside?? My neighbor, John, posed that question and I don’t think I want to know the answer. We’ll just assume it was somebody on a motorcycle who had to change clothes in a hurry, and leave it at that.

Ok, I can see how you might lose a shirt or something small out of the car and not notice it, but what about a mattress? I actually saw a mattress driving down the road one day. (the mattress wasn’t driving, it was laying beside the road) Can you really lose a mattress and not know it fell off the truck? I guess stranger things have happened.

You can’t not make up a story to go with that  – here’s my version: It was being hauled in a pickup truck — probably an old, brown truck with holes rusted out on the sides. The guy driving was helping his brother move and decided not to tie down the mattress since it was just down the road. He gets to the new house, pulls in, walks around to unload the truck and wonders who stole the mattress. I’m telling  you, this really could happen around here. Living in this part of the country lends itself to many a colorful story.

I’ve let my imagination run away more than once when I see something by the road. A box or an old brown rug in the distance can look just like a furry critter from several feet back. Here I am, enjoying the sights when I spot something large and brownish looking up ahead. I start sighing, “poor thing — what is that?” My mind starts to imagine what it could be. “Oh, it’s a big dog or a deer…”  My eyes are welling up – I’m expecting the worst. Then we get up to it. It ends up being a big brown rug or a clump of hay.

Who knows what I’ll see beside the road the next time I go out. We do live near a flea market that meets every weekend. Somebody could have dropped some of their flea stuff off an old truck when they were heading out. Maybe it will be something I can actually use.