Ded Merozh and the Auto Club

Oh man, just add a raffle, sitting with Santa and a car accident to Anya's holiday learning adventures for the night. We were in a building when our car was hit, so we're all fine, but.....Anya did give the old man who hit us the stink eye as she walked by.

Let's back up. The holiday season is upon us. The Los Angeles chapter of Little People of America (LPA) was having their Christmas party in Culver City, about 40 miles away from us, into Los Angeles. Dave was working so I packed up Anya and headed off to the party. Anya was excited to be able to dance. I think it would be exciting to dance and have people at my head level instead of dancing with your face in everyone's backsides.

I parked out in front of the Elks Lodge and at the last minute decided to hold fast to my frugal side and not pay for parking at the meter. Plus it didn't appear you could get in from the street side. So, I pulled out and headed into the back parking lot. I headed down the alley which had parking on both sides. Just past the alley, it opened into a larger parking lot and there was a row just past the end of the alley. I noticed that the first car in that row was our friends' car. Anya did too and pointed at it excitedly. I actually meant to call them before the party to see if the mother and daughter needed a ride (in case the father was working-he's an actor) since they live so close to us. But, I never did. There was an empty space next to their car, so I took it.

view of alley from lot back to street

Into the party we went. I was pretty proud of Anya's emotional growth. Previously she would melt down being around so many little people. It is very different if you aren't used to it. In fact, I made a bit of a mistake, and luckily the woman involved didn't notice. We were getting ready to get dinner and I told Anya, "Come on, let's get in line." I am really used to her being the only 3 1/2' high person standing around my hip. I started walking and lost her for a moment. I kind of barked out, "Come ON, let's get in line!" only to discover I was basically yelling at a 40 year old woman, not Anya. Whoops. Anyway, Anya was pretty calm and not going into a frightened younger girl state. 


We sat with our friends Art and Dawn and ate dinner. As we finished someone came up to Art and told him his car was hit. I joked to Dawn that if there was damage, I could take them home. As soon as I said that, a lady came near out table and asked who owned the white Lexus. Uh, that would be me.


I asked Dawn, who is legally blind, to watch Anya. Shows how much I was thinking. But I only knew three people there and Art was already outside. I just knew that if I needed to get information and such out in a parking lot, trying to keep an eye on Anya, who would surely be melting down due to the "catastrophe" in her eyes, it wasn't going to be a good situation. So, I told An to stay and went outside. As a side note, I walked out our front door on the way to the party thinking, "Boy it's cold, I should get a coat. No. I am just going from the car to the building and back," I had a similar thought about the cute heels I wore too. 

There it was. An old man and his Honda, t-boned into Art's car which had pushed my car. It looked like he came down the alley and just kept going into the line of parked cars. I just had a dent in the bumper, but our friends' car was considered totaled. Came to find out from a man at the party that was outside when the collision occured, that he turned off the man's car and had to take the old man's foot off of the accelerator. Turns out the man jumped the concrete parking stop and mixed up the gas and brake pedal and kept giving it gas.

The burgundy car is now in my parking spot and I am moved over into a bit of the next one.

Look how close my white car is to the van on the left. There were two men in that van, one changing into a Santa suit for the kids, when the accident occured. But they weren't harmed at all!


After a call to the Auto Club, the police officer arriving and the tow trucks showing up, two hours had passed. I wanted my compact down coat I keep in the car for such purposes, but in a tizzy, couldn't find it. A sweet young woman named Sandy, who also took these photos, offered me her pea coat, but it didn't fit over my other velvet shrug I had on and I wouldn't be any warmer with just her coat. I got a blanket out of the car and had it wrapped around me for some time. At one point, a man from the party came out and put his big wool coat over my shoulders. I just kept trying to remember not to put my keys in his pockets and send him home with them.


Many people came out to talk to us and the other lady I knew a bit, Anel, came out as well. I asked her to watch Anya and apparently, when Anel went to restroom, Anya hightailed it outside to see where her Mama was and what was going on. I did let her come over to me after we had finished the main business and were waiting on the tow truck. She gets all worked up if the dog walks by and brushes her so I knew a car accident was going to be epic and that she would fixate on it. She handled it much better than I expected. I explained all I could think of to her and she walked over to the back of our car and was caressing it. Then she passed by the elderly gentleman and as I mentioned, gave him a long version of what we call the Stink Eye. Anya was moving around the scene trying to help Art too. She even got to shake the officer's hand. Once the tow trucks were finished, we moved back into the party. Didn't I mention that Art is an actor? And that I was FREEZING and my feet were HURTING? Art has a role as basically the Simon Cowell of Spanish TV's variety show Estudio 2 (on Estrella TV network)-he's el Machete. So, he's talking to the tow truck drivers in Spanish and it comes up. They get all excited and keep chattering on (later I turned around and one of them was posing in front of the smashed cars with Art while the other took a picture). I literally said, "I hate to interrupt all this excitement, but I want to go inside and here is my Auto Club card for you to see." They laughed.

Anya "helping" Art, right in the middle of it all.

There I am wrapped in a blanket.

When I sent Anya back in after Santa at one point, I yelled out, "An, go inside and talk to Ded Marozh! (Grandfather Frost or Santa-and this was her first visit with him)" at which point someone asked if I spoke Russian and a short version of Anya's whole story came out. Anel came outside during the wait and told me Anya sat with Santa and that she is an escape artist as well! Anya told me that Santa gave her nail polish. Her response to Santa was, "I DON'T LIKE nail polish." Oh, the things the girl still has to learn...


Once inside the party got better after a buffet that included macaroni and cheese and all the dancing. Anya chose different women to dance with, pulling them out on the floor.

She REALLY feels the music.

We bought some raffle tickets and I never explained how it worked in detail to Anya. We stood in front of the items and put our tickets into the boxes in front of the item. As we approached the Kindle Fire, Anya reached over to take it. I guess she thought that the tickets enabled her to have the items. As the numbers were read, Anya was frustrated that she wasn't getting the items. "But it's mine." For the last item, the man who brought me his coat let Anya shake the box and read out the winning number. For the previous items, other kids read them slowly and softly, but as you know about Anya and PA systems, she doesn't know she has to speak lowly into microphones and such. She announced very loudly, firmly and clearly the numbers. Very cute and very Russian!

Somewhere close to 10pm!

After more dancing and the raffle, I loaded up Anya, Dawn, her daughter and their friend into our car (Art went home with the tow truck) and headed home for some well deserved sleep. 

Still alive the next morning!
~Monica