Hold Up The Pickles, Not Us!

Hold the pickles, hold the lettuce
thank God for the driver in the bus
two gunmen the cops did ketchup to
didn't have their way, have it their way!


This is a love story as much as it is one of heroics,
virtually scribbling its harrowing tale on four loose leaf pages less than an hour after Hallmark Channel's called for entries from its millions of viewers. They asked for specific incidences of how a spouse or friend who demonstrated love through their actions.

They would be airing little vinettes of each winning entry over their network. Rules stated each submission was to be two thousand "characters" or less, using the e-mail entry form provided on their web site. I didn't read the rules correctly, as usual, so I was forced to shorten and change it quite a bit. Well I thought it had to be two thousand "words" or less. Alas, not wasted, for here it is, the longer version.

It focuses on the man I consider my best friend for the past twenty-nine years. I have to say in all honesty, I am even more in love with him today then I was when we were first married. In 1978, we were two kids wet behind the ears in matters of life and love not to mention always broke! Too cliche, all this wedded bliss? Well I can tell you it is the cause of my suffering with middle-aged butterflies, similar to the ones I used to get in my stomach waiting for Craig (his real name) to pick me up for a date. The difference is middle-aged ones flutter when a man does the dishes, cleans the bathroom and even sits with you through a chick flick!

Back to what happened in September of 2002. My husband and I had taken two ladies from our small church located in West Islip,
New York, to a conference in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The last night of the week long conference, before returning to our hotel, we decided to stop at a Burger King along the highway. Mind you, it was three women and Craig. Well you know who wanted to go to Jack in the Box but we outnumbered him, making Burger King the big winner.

It was ten thirty when we passed under the golden arches. Oh, wrong, it was where you get it your own way. We got on line
behind a large youth group from the State of Florida, the four of us hoping there would be food left over, never mind getting it customed ordered! Surprisingly, ten minutes later we were sitting in our crowded booth hearing the wonderful sounds of
paper peeling off the burgers and checking for fries that might have escaped their greasy boxes. I should of known right then something was wrong when I had to ask where's the beef? That rarely happens but my patty is missing. To top it off, I almost knocked over my mega size cola. Sorry, the Queen of Pun should put a lid on it considering what happened next.

After finishing our meal and quickly chewing on a roll of tums, we made our way towards the exit. It was a few minutes after 11:00 pm and just as we were about to leave, two boys dressed like robbers burst through the fingerprinted doors. I remember being so angry at them for waving toys guns in our faces, scaring everyone. The children ranging from eight to fourteen, were just starting to panic which made me even angrier that these youth could play such such a sick joke on their own!

I turned to the masked kid who was pointing a gun at my chest,

"You should be ashamed of yourself for scaring the children!" pointing my own trigger finger in his face, feeling like Dorothy admonishing the Lion.

I am sure there was more I said, there always is, and after getting that off my chest, I started again for the door until the voice behind the gun growled,

"Lady, I wouldn't advise leaving" in a tone that had me for the first time since they made their dramatic entrance, wondering if this was a real robbery! It was, surprise!

Spiderman, Superman, Batman, eat your hearts out! My husband, a/k/a Italianman, with no thought to his own life, diverted that same gunmen who had turned his attention from me to a group of young children huddled together, Italianman began to plead,

"Don't do it, God loves you, it's not worth it!" talking as if the gunmen was contemplating jumping off a ledge instead of aiming his weapon at the children now shaking and crying.

The gun now was barely an inch from Italianman's temple. I'm sure everyone said a silent prayer that the bullet would not enter there and the situation be altered. Sorry, but humor seems to help when I tell this story, don't misunderstand me I never thought it was funny for a moment, I just deal better with it this way! The pistol remained there for what seemed an eternity while the gunman's accomplice emptied all the registers.

Italian man later told me all he thought about during those fateful moments was "Is the bullet going in going to hurt?"

All of a sudden the gunman cocked the gun and a bullet fell on the tiled floor right in front of my husband! Talk about needing to use the restroom! Having collected what they came in for, the
two waved their guns a final time around the crowded restaurant and then ran out.

Again, not that there is anything funny at all about a robbery (you would never know it from me) but it did give a chuckle when I found out because of the baggy pants they were wearing, it tripped them up as they ran across a field during their botched getaway. Dropping all the booty and having to pick it up, gave the police the extra time needed to to catch up to them before they disappeared. That is exactly what happened, and thank God, no one was hurt!

What we didn't learn until later, the bus driver transporting the youth, needing a "break" from them and ate alone in the bus while this was all going down. The driver called the police the moment they walked into the restaurant. Another hero at Burger King.

Getting back to the theme of a love story (of sorts), I can tell you when I saw my husband risk his life to protect all those children, nothing could have made him look better in my eyes. That is how his whole life is, not just one night of heroics for my Italianman, he never thinks of himself only others. Now that is what I call a real man, a hunk! You may say most men would of done the exact same thing, but maybe not when you learn it happened in what the detective who took our report said was the "hood" and that we were nuts to have stopped for a burger here of all places! We were used to our safe Manhattan, so we never gave it a thought!

As a side note, we were told by two friends that they were praying for us the week leading up to that night, sensing we would need protection of some kind. It took me, not Italianman, a while before I was comfortable going to a Burger King or even a McDonalds. But when the craving for greasy fries overrides my fears, I have it my way and say, Hold the pickles, hold the lettuce, and most of all, please don't hold me up again!