On Monday after a long day teaching, I stopped by the Acme to pick up a few things. In the parking lot, I pulled up next to this car.

I could not just walk into the grocery store and ignore this brilliant oddity. I walked around looking at it and decided it was a sea monster. Then a woman pushing a cart came right over to the car.

“Is this yours?”

“Yes.”

“How did you do it?”

Turns out she is a retired art teacher who lives in Florida but spends the summers (I think i got this right) in Kutztown. She decided when she retired to paint her white car her passion. She used sand paper to rough up the paint and then applied layers of semi-gloss exterior house paint to create a tortuga turtle.

We talked a bit more while she loaded in her groceries and both agreed it was a beautiful late spring day.

I could have just stayed focused on being grumpy and tense after a long day but instead shifted attention to something wondrous and met a person who does what she wants and does not worry about the details.