A Christmas Play on Life

Last December I picked up a woman who had a most extraordinary European business trip. I'll call her Ella. Her trip started out routinely enough. Everything was going as scripted. What Ella hadn't planned on was two days of the bizarre.

Ella was sitting at the front end of a rail car on a high-speed train that was nearing Zurich, when without warning there was a flash followed by a deafening bang. She feared her hearing might be nearly lost. It took hours for the pain to subside. Had she been riding in the car just ahead, surly she would have been injured or killed. She was happy to be alive. She later found it odd that there was no mention of the incident in the news, local or otherwise.

That next day in Zurich, though still shook up, Ella managed a successful meeting. She was looking forward to retiring to her hotel room to enjoy a nice hot shower, but it wasn't to be. One of the men coerced her into having dinner with his girlfriend. The businessman insisted that he would 'seal the deal' if Ella would have a night out with his girlfriend, for she was desperate for a woman's company; she needed someone to share girl talk with.

Around eight that night an exhausted Ella found herself in a five star restaurant with the girlfriend, a Paris Hilton look-alike. On entering the room the girlfriend caused diners to stop mid-bite and the wait staff to scurry about.

They had barely been seated at the table when the girlfriend with tears in her eyes began to tell Ella her, up to that point, life story. She had been born into great wealth, which she said was for the most part from oil money. She hated it. The damned dirty oil had murdered her mother. Actually her stepfather had murdered her mother over the oil riches. She just knew it! She stopped just long enough, while wiping her nose, to order dinner.

Abruptly, the girlfriend stood up and announced she needed some air, and walked out. Ella said she welcomed the chance to be alone. Since boarding the train the day before her life had felt unreal, as if she were acting out a part on a theater stage.

The girlfriend returned, but she wasn't alone. As she walked in with a man on each arm, two chairs were added to the table. The girlfriend explained to Ella, "These poor men need to eat!" They were strangers she had met while out for a smoke.

Eating four very expensive meals, Ella and the men heard more of the girlfriend's determination to bring to justice the stepfather who had killed her mother. Her sobs were soon all that was heard in the room. When the girlfriend realized that she was causing a scene she stood up, raised her glass and with an apology to the entire restaurant announced, "Dinner is on me!"

In Ella's driveway as I was taking her bags out of the back of the taxi she said, "Look at this." Ella had wrapped herself in a beautiful grey fur scarf. The girlfriend had insisted Ella might be cold on her way home.

To me, Ella said, "Damned dirty oil, indeed."