Incident in Arundel
Last Sunday
morning, our usual Sunday morning turbo training session with friends at
Arundel Fire Station went very well. A nice little group of us all working hard
together for two hours and ending up hot, red and sweaty but happy to have got
through the session to the satisfaction of all.
After
packing our bikes, turbo trainers, bike shoes, towels etc. back in our van we
headed into Arundel for the usual post training reward of a few minutes calming
down over lovely cup of coffee in High Street haunt.
We had
parked the van on the hill and walked down to the café, ordered our cappuccino
and sat down. We were quickly served at the table we had settled at.
We had
taken the first sip of our coffee when two men burst into the café and strode
over to the table that we were seated at very aggressively. The taller of the
two shouted men at us that Steve he had driven into his car. The whole place
fell silent and turned to watch. Steve said that he didn’t think he had driven
into his car. At this, the man got his phone out and showed that he claimed was
his photo showing that Steve had hit his car, Steve said he thought he would
know if he had, but said he was sorry to the man if he had done any damage. The
man’s voice went up considerably in volume and demanded that Steve come and
look at the damage he had done at once. Steve said that he would be out in a
moment when he had drunk his coffee. The man then shouted so alarmingly that
Steve got up and went to the counter to pay and follow the man out. The younger
man said nothing all the while.
Steve told
me the stay there and drink my coffee, but I was too harassed and embarrassed
to stay there with everybody staring. I asked the waiter to leave our coffees
for while in case we came back in the drink them. Then I followed Steve and Mr.
Aggression out into the High Street and followed them up the road. I had my
camera in the front of the van and intended to take photos, as one does in the
case of an accident and especially since neither of us thought there had been a
collision. We would have known and indeed felt it. It crossed my mind that it
might be an attempted scam.
When I got
back up to our parking spot, Steve had got into our van and moved it forward to
see if there was any damage. The man was still carrying on in alarming,
shouting at Steve and name calling, and I thought, in a threateningly loud
voice. Everybody in the street was staring at the scene.
I opened
the front of the van and got my camera out, and walked round to the back of our
vehicle and squatted down to take photographs of the front of the man’s car and
the back of our van.
There was
no damage of any kind at all. Not on his car and not on ours.
I carried
on taking photos of the scene until the man, who was quite tall, well much
taller than me anyway, and quite big, started shouting at me, telling me that I
could not take photos. I turned and took a photo of him! That REALLY upset him.
He grabbed my wrist and twisted my arm, taking my camera out of my hand with
his other hand, I thought he was going to hit me. When this was happening, the
younger man shouted, “Back off dad,
back off, stop dad, stop, stop”.
The man
shouted at me saying I could not take photo’s. I replied that yes I could take
photos and what he could not do, was to go around attacking seventy six year
old ladies. The son was still telling his dad to stop and he did finally. He
still held my camera out of my reach for a moment before letting me take it
back.
Whilst this
was going on, the rest of the family group, I think five in all including a
blonde woman that I presumed was the man’s wife, had all looked and agreed with
Steve that there was no damage at all. Steve had been getting out his papers
from the front of the van and looking for a pen and not finding one.
Steve asked me to get into the van and wait whilst the scene settled. The man did not
make any sort of apology. He was a thoroughly nasty piece of work, aggressive
and very rude.
Steve got
back in the van and we drove away. We did not go back for our coffee we were both
too upset. We drove home hardly saying anything, Steve knew that I was a bit
shocked and just left me to my thoughts. What I was thinking was, that that man
was quite nicely dressed in a winter overcoat, and his family who were also
nicely dressed Steve told me that they were on holiday. We on the other hand
looked pretty bad. We both had sweaty hair and were possibly a bit smelly,
though we had towelled down. We were wearing old sweat pants and sweat shirts
and jackets and trainers. Still no excuse for such aggressive noisy behaviour
from that man.
My husband
knows me well. He knows that I need time to settle after an upset. He is a very
peaceful kind person. We did not speak it the incident at all on the way home
or indeed for the rest of the day and have not discussed it at all even now two
and a half days later. I prefer to not to dwell on unpleasantness and after
thirty nine years together have a deep understanding of the others feelings. I
didn’t sleep well that night, or the next night either, it takes me a while to
stop turning things over in my head.
1 comment:
Omg, i hope you called the Police!!!! you did didn't you??. If not do it retrospectively.
Post a Comment