I was in almost three wrecks coming home today with my child in the car. None of them would have been my fault. One of those was a near head-on collision while I was going 60 mph. I swerved onto the shoulder in time as my heart skipped a few beats and fell into my stomach. The man who crossed the center line and nearly cost me and my child our lives was TALKING ON HIS PHONE.
A woman driver drifted into my lane as I was passing her on the left. When I blared my horn at her, she looked up from TEXTING and gave me a nasty scowl as if it was somehow *my* fault.
The last person was going 30 mph in a 55 mph zone. I was going about 59 mph, came around a curve, and almost plowed into him. He was talking on his cell phone.
Talking on a phone or texting while driving is the highest form of self-absorption. The world does not revolve around one person! Someone pretending that s/he’s still a “good” driver even while talking on the phone or texting (or any form of distracted driving) is a puerile fantasy. No one is invincible. No phone call or text is worth some else’s life. HANG UP YOUR PHONES, PEOPLE. That phone call can wait. THAT TEXT CAN WAIT. Only obtuseness and arrogance would enable anyone to think that “it won’t happen to them.”
Think about that. Because, folks, It can happen to ANYONE.
Can you live the rest of your life knowing you killed a child because you just *had* to take that phone call or send/read that text… that could have waited?
I couldn’t.
I wrote a post in this blog about distracted driving a while back.
Check out these links:
http://www.att.com/gen/press-room?pid=2964
http://www.caranddriver.com/features/09q2/texting_while_driving_how_dangerous_is_it_-feature
http://www.distraction.gov/index.html
