Commando

The legendary, Grammy-winning blues musician Muddy Waters, it turns out, lived out his final years in my little town.  He thought it was the best place on Earth.  You know this guy, even if you don’t know him.  He’s the dude who wrote that blues song that’s been featured in a million movies and commercials.  You know, this one:

I’m a man (dun DUN dun DUN dun)
A full grown man (dun DUN dun DUN dun)

Anyway, every July they hold a big street festival for four days, featuring many Muddy Waters tribute bands of varying quality (or lack thereof), and I don’t even have to go to the street fair to involuntarily hear them because they set up the stage on my town’s main street, from which I live just around the corner.

This is great fun for my neighbors and I, because in addition to involuntarily hearing mediocre blues covers for four straight days, all the traffic gets rerouted down our street, and all the festival goers park in front of our houses.  Post-festival Monday is usually spent picking trash off our lawns.

This year, fortunately, I planned ahead by turning my lawn into an overgrown jungle that no one would possibly want to cut through.  That was definitely intentional.

It turns out this defense was necessary, because on of my neighbors reports that this year some drunken festival attendees, cutting through her back yard in the dark, accidentally fell into her koi pond.

So my lawn fared well, garbage-wise, but some of my neighbors were apparently not so fortunate, as my Monday morning, post-festival walk to the train station yielded this discovery:

I’m not really sure WHY there’s a black lace thong on my neighbor’s lawn.  The bands definitely weren’t good enough to warrant the throwing of panties at the stage.  Maybe they fell off a clothes line and the wind blew them there.  Maybe there was a terrible accident involving an exploding washing machine during the delicates cycle, and the neighborhood is now littered with fancy silk and lace shrapnel.

I’m letting my imagination run away from me, here.  Given its proximity to the sidewalk, someone obviously dropped the panties there; probably a fellow train commuter.  Maybe it was one of those things where you put on a shirt straight from the dryer and manage to get all the way to work without realizing there’s a sock balled up in the sleeve.  … Except with panties, obviously.

Or, maybe a fellow commuter keeps emergency sexy underwear in her purse (like ya do) and, while rummaging through her bag for a piece of gum or similar, did not notice the thong falling out.

My simultaneously favorite and least favorite possibility is that someone was wearing them, and, halfway through the walk to the train, realized that thongs are awful, and so, in a fit of rage, she instantly removed them, threw them to the ground, and opted to go commando.

I will probably never know how they got there, and I guess it really doesn’t matter, because the more pressing issue is that it’s now Tuesday morning and I appear to be the only one who’s noticed they’re there.  Obviously, the moral responsibility for dealing with them falls on me.  What do I do about them?  Pick them up?  Certainly not with my HANDS–there’s no clear indication of whether they’re clean or…used, and I’m not taking any chances.  I guess I could pick them up with a stick or something… But then, what do I DO with them?  My neighborhood is an active sort of place, with people out and about all the time (and a definite weirdness factor) and I would definitely be spotted walking home with panties on a stick.

I guess it’s not really my problem.  I could knock on the door and alert the homeowners about their lawn panty problem.  But how would that go?  (“Excuse me.  Hi, I’m your neighbor down the street.  Are these yours?  …No, I suppose not, sir.  No, I’m not insinuating anything, I just…”)

I’ve gotta do SOMETHING about it, because it’s pretty clear that if I don’t, the panties will not be dealt with until my neighbors mow their lawn next, which, given how dry it’s been lately, could be quite some time.  I just hope they spot them before the lawn mower runs them over.  I’m imagining there would be a spectacular slingshot effect.