The Fragile Nature of it All
I witnessed a car accident.
It happened in the turning lane of a mall. On my way with a friend to pick up a customized birthday cake from a bakery. The driver in front of me in a white Chevy Equinox LT, their left signal on to turn. Straight ahead, on the opposite side of traffic a black BMW coming straight ahead with speed. The driver in front of me takes the left turn.
In the nanoseconds before everything unfolds, I think to myself: “That BMW is coming pretty fast. Compared to the relaxed turn speed of the Equinox, it doesn’t seem adequate to clear the BMW in time.” A millisecond later a loud crash. The BMW t-bones the Equinox from the passenger-side and flips it onto the driver’s side.
It happened so fast.
After a brief moment of shock, I jumped out of my vehicle and called 911. People begin to rush to the overturned Chevy. Collectively, we discover the driver is a woman. She's alive and conscious. But her passenger door is pinned shut. My car is holding up traffic, my friend jumps into the driver seat and goes to park it. I'm speaking with the 911 operator, she's asking me for an address. There are no immediate street signs where I am. I tell her the largest thing I see, a JC Penny and the name of the mall we're at. Help is en route she says. I thank her and hang up.
The front bumper of the BMW is smashed in. The hood is severely bent. The driver of the BMW opens the door. It’s a thirty-something-year-old man. I see the airbags have deployed. He slowly gets out of the car, He looks disoriented. He may have hit his head on the steering wheel before the airbags deployed. He moves with anguish.
The firefighters arrive. Quickly they take control of the scene. They break the windshield glass of the overturned Chevy and cut the door open. The woman is alone in the vehicle. Thankfully no children are on board. They removed the woman from the vehicle fast and shuttled her into a waiting ambulance. Police are also now on the scene. They’re inspecting the scene a bit. Another person is talking to the driver of the BMW. He’s hunched over, nursing his forehead. Thankfully, everyone appears to be okay.
My friend and I walk away from the accident to get back to our cake mission. And I can't help but think how fragile life is. How life can seem like a short film. Both of the drivers in the accident appear to have been coming for their respective workplaces. I thought about how neither of them likely woke up this morning expecting to be in a car accident, totaling both of their pristine vehicles. The fragile nature of it all.
We have no idea what the next moment holds for us. We can pretend to think we control all the cards in life. But we don’t. The popular phrase, often attributed to writer/director Woody Allen: “If you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans.” We control nothing outside of our own individual actions, reactions and mindset. It’s beautifully humbling.
The speed of life is vivid. The potential crash-course collision of different variables and possibilities are infinite. How can we ever know just how we will come to an intersection of life and experience something new? Each person takes away a different perspective of the same story. I expected a routine run to the bakery. I wasn’t expecting to be the first one out of my vehicle, the one making the phone call to notify help.
Things happen in life. Unexpected, shocking, horrifying, scary, beautiful--everything across the spectrum. It doesn’t mean you run away. It doesn’t mean you buckle under the pressure. It means you quickly accept this new reality and operate accordingly. Being smart, educating yourself, thinking for yourself, not being reckless and taking the necessary precautions.
One personal definition of fear to me is: the rejection of a new/foreign experience. This can easily incite fear. “This is something new and uncomfortable, therefore I don’t like it.” If someone who has never spoken in front of a large audience, the speaker may naturally begin to feel timid and reluctant. The rejection of a new and/or foreign experience. The 24/7 news cycle can often leave us feeling anxious, afraid and worried. But it’s our sole responsibility to guard our individual mindsets at all costs. Blaming outside forces is pointless. Our continual peace-of-mind is OUR continual problem to solve for ourselves. Yes, we can be helped by friends, family and loved ones, but the deep inner work still rests on our shoulders.
In February 2017 at the NAACP Image Awards, accepting the honor for “Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture” for his work in FENCES, actor Denzel Washington took the stage. There he said, “Without commitment you’ll never start. But more importantly, without consistency, you’ll never finish.” He continued: “Ease is a greater threat to progress than hardship.” Elegantly, he concluded: “So keep moving, keep growing, keep learning. See you at work.”
And there’s always work to be done.
JSR.