A Christmas story

If you think you've seen that title on a previous post on my blog, you're right. I've reused the title with another story that will warm your heart as the big day approaches.

It starts on Wednesday, when Flora left Chicago to come visit her son in Lincoln.  On the way, she stopped at a rest area in eastern Iowa.  In the ladies room, she found a black Coach purse, apparently left behind by another traveler.  Flora made it to Lincoln in the grip of a major winter snowstorm, and yesterday morning, Flora dropped the purse off at the police station.  Toby, one of our staff members in the Property & Evidence Unit, decided she would try to find its owner  She found the ID of Audrey in the purse, from Hebron, Kentucky.

There was no answer at the home phone number in Kentucky, and Toby surmised that Audrey was probably still on the road.  She couldn't find a cell phone number in the purse, but she did find an appointment card from a doctor's office back in Kentucky. Through the receptionist at that office, Toby was able to get Audrey's cell phone number, and called to let her know that her purse--contents intact--had been found.  When Toby told Audrey that a citizen had found the purse 300 miles away, but had turned it in to the police in Lincoln, Nebraska, there was a moment of silence on the phone, and then Audrey stammered, "I can't believe this!"

Audrey, a military wife travelling with three little daughters to her mother's home in Oregon, was actually in Lincoln, too! She was at the Cobbler Inn--on the west edge of town, stranded overnight by a good old fashioned Nebraska blizzard that had closed Interstate 80 westbound by the time she realized her purse had gone AWOL.  She had no cash, no credit cards, nothing for food or gas.  Her mom had been able to get the motel room Wednesday night with a credit card number phoned in from Oregon, but Audrey was facing the daunting logistics of getting back on the road Thursday in her penniless condition after leaving her life on a bathroom counter a couple hours east of Des Moines, Iowa.

Officer Mario Robinson overheard the telephone conversation between Toby and Audrey, and learned that Audrey's car was running on fumes when they pulled into the Cobbler Inn the previous night.  Rather than directing her to HQ and risking running out of gas, he volunteered to get the delivery made.  He passed the football to Sgt. Grant Richards, who reunited Audrey with her Coach a few minutes later at the motel. I can only imagine her relief.

You've got to appreciate the incredible coincidence that brought Flora and Audrey to the same place at about the same time in a blizzard, not once, but twice, a few hundred miles apart, and resulted in getting the girls back on the way to grandma's house for Christmas.  Or (if you're like me) rather than coincidence, you can consider this just another example of the Hand on the chessboard.

Merry Christmas Audrey and Flora, and thank you Toby, for going the extra mile to make the season bright for a soldier's family caught in a big storm and a small crisis!