Roadkill Cafe Part 2 - A seemingly close call with a 1943 Walter P38 handgun
Half of the fun of riding motorcycle is the random places I find and the interesting people I meet. Part 2 of our stop at Road Kill Cafe in PA - not only was the place interesting, the older gentleman we met as we were leaving cemented the place in our memory for life!
He didn’t point it at us,
but he swung it around enough to make us a little nervous on what was going to
happen next. He began to uncase the gun, while having it still pointed directly
at us, and that’s when I noticed the gold emblem on the side of the gun
case. Not just a plan gold emblem, but a
swastika.
As he uncased the 1943 Walter P38 pistol from its leather case with the swastika emblem, his right index finger meandered over the trigger.
I
shuffled slightly the right and nudged Stiffy to do the same. The seemingly
harmless older gentleman may not have any intention of harming us, but he was
continuously pointing a gun with a swastika on the case directly at us and now
had his pointer finger over the trigger. I could only assume the gun was
loaded, and no offense, but given the older gentleman's state of mind during the
conversation in which he was adamant that Stiffy knew his wife, well, I had
some concerns on how this situation was going to play out. While I kind of
wanted to handle the gun when he offered, I instead declined, I admit, mostly
out of fear and shock of what was happening. When asked how he got the gun, he
did not offer much information, he just snickered and said that the gun was
carried by German Army during WWII. While I don’t know a lot about guns, this
thing was indeed a relic with more history behind it than one could imagine. I
asked if I could take a picture and he was more than happy to allow me to do
so. After some brief conversation, he re-holstered the gun, told Stiffy he
would tell his wife that she said hello, and then parted ways. At the next gas
stop, stiffy and I got off our bikes with a look of disbelief between us. WTH
had just happened? DID that really happen??!! And as we scrolled through the
pictures, trying to show our minds proof of the event, we noticed that there
was blood on the older man’s shirt. Had we seen that while we were standing
there, in the middle of the gravel parking lot in front of Road Kill Café, we
probably wouldn’t have carried on a conversation with the man. But now, after
the fact, I wish I would’ve asked him more questions and learned about the
reality of the history this man has seen. The people I meet while riding
motorcycle are diverse and almost always interesting folks!!
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