She just stared at me.
Road rage and carnage in California.
She just stared at me. She was in her late twenties, with flowing brown hair and clear pale skin. A real beauty. I met her on my morning commute.
I was on my way to my shitty job along one of the shittiest drives around: the 880 from Oakland to San Jose. Every freaking day, stop and start traffic with no rhyme or reason. The average speed might have been 25mph but it usually varied between either “parking lot” or Daytona 500.
Because of the stop and go, I’d usually leave a few car lengths between myself and the car in front. So if someone stops suddenly, I’d have plenty of time to stop. And more importantly, so the person behind me, who is probably sending text messages, has plenty of time to stop.
Leaving extra space is unusual in California. Tailgating is the rule. It doesn’t get anyone anywhere any faster, but that doesn’t stop people from trying. Part of the problem is that before 9AM one of the lanes is reserved for car-pools, effectively turning a five-lane freeway into a four-lane freeway. Thanks government.
Anyways, when 9AM hits there is a mad scramble to merge into that extra lane. That’s when I met the young lady with flowing brown hair. She swerved her little red car through the space in front of me to get into the newly open lane. But she wasn’t the only person with that idea. The car pool lane was quickly jammed up as all the other lanes now.
She had to stop.
Then a tire truck appeared in my peripheral vision, also in the car pool lane and going much too fast. I knew immediately that it was going to hit the little red car. The truck driver stood on the brakes and the front of the truck dove into the ground. It was no use. He made a last second effort to swerve onto the shoulder - but the concrete barrier repelled him.
The truck smashed the left corner of the little red Civic and there was an explosion of glass. Then the little red car ricocheted back into my lane, bouncing off an SUV and then beneath the wheels of a freight truck in the adjacent lane.
Crunching metal and glass explosions came from other directions too, the first crash setting off others, but so far missing me.
The big truck pulled over, with fuel gushing out of one of its big chrome tanks. Oh boy that’s not where I wanted to be. So when a gap appeared I took it. As I moved through, I passed by the little red car and came face to face with the young woman. Her hair was no longer flowing.
I didn’t know who she was or where she was going in such a rush. Maybe she was late for work, or on her way to daycare, or just to get her nails done. I suppose it seemed pretty important to her at the time. Maybe she was someone’s wife, or someone’s mother, certainly she was someone’s daughter. I asked as I drove by, but she did not reply. She did not cry. She did not blink.
She just stared at me.
Epilogue…
The next morning I was on the same commute, not far from the scene of the young woman’s demise. As usual I kept some open space in front of me. Just for safety. The driver behind me did not. He was driving a delivery van and whether we were going 0 or 75 he stayed right on my bumper.
I guess he was annoyed. I guess he wanted to be in the empty spot right in front of me so he could save two seconds and tailgate the next guy along the road. And soon I didn’t have to guess. He swerved into the next lane, pulled up alongside, rolled down his window and began to shout at me.
I rolled down my window and let him.
He was sure upset. Plenty mad. Giving me a piece of his mind and instructing me on “how to drive.” Or something like that. Kind of hard to hear anything in freeway traffic. But then traffic slowed. And then it stopped. And there we were side by side with windows down.
His tirade also slowed then stopped.
I guess I could have pointed out how futile his anger was. I guess I could have told him about the accident the day before, about the girl with flowing brown hair. I guess I could have mocked him. I guess I could have explained that the temporary pain of this commute was meaningless in comparison to the blessing of life.
But would it have mattered? Would he even hear? Comprehend? Find peace? I doubted it.
I just stared at him.