I Nearly Killed You Last Week

I nearly killed you last week.

You, of course, didn’t notice—preoccupied as you were with that oh, so important phone call (though judging by your laughter and coquettish looks moments later…well, it seemed rather light-hearted).

I was driving a 78,000-pound tractor-trailer rig through Birmingham, barreling downhill and struggling to maintain control (the city’s government forbids the use of engine brakes, by the way—making things even dicier) when you made a U-turn across three lanes of traffic to plant your pretty self right in front of me—at a speed about twenty miles per hour slower than mine.

How you could fail to notice a thirteen-and-a-half feet tall, eight-and-a-half feet wide truck lit up like Macy’s on Christmas Eve (though it was broad daylight) coming right at you is beyond me; as I said, though, your phone conversation obviously was mighty important.

Important enough to risk your life?

Well, you did.

Under ideal conditions with a relatively light load on flat, dry pavement, it takes a lo-oooong time to stop a truck; going downhill at nearly the maximum legal weight stacks the deck against you to a degree you can’t even fathom.

I noticed the temporary license tag on your car, by the way. Brand new. Very pretty.

Had I been unable to avoid you, the impact would’ve had the practical effect of dropping your pretty new car into a trash compacter—with you in it.

I suppose I should give you credit, though; at least, you weren’t “texting” (which is even more distracting—and appears to have been contributory to a significant number of fatal mishaps), you didn’t have a child in the back seat (unlike the woman in Dallas last month–also talking on her phone, by the way–who cruised right through a stop sign just as I started a left turn in front of her; she never did stop—though she did look directly at me and cringe when she saw the nose of my tractor dip as I hit the brakes), and you weren’t doing anything patently illegal (unlike the guy driving the Volvo station wagon near Town Creek, Alabama who was so concerned with the safety of the two kids he had securely strapped into their car seats that he purchased the vehicle touted by its manufacturer as “the safest car in the world”; Volvo, however, can’t indemnify idiots who try to pass trucks on the shoulder of a two-lane highway and manage to just miss a looming bridge abutment by a split second—though he skillfully continued his phone conversation throughout. He seemed to not even notice that I nearly rolled over my truck in my attempt to avoid him. I had to shake my head at the irony of the “CAUTION: CHILD ON BOARD” sticker that adorned his car’s rear bumper.)

Sadly, these are not fabrications; all these events occurred as described. Worse, they’re becoming more commonplace.

Ask any truck driver: when we see an expensive late-model car going usually five to ten miles per hour below the posted speed limit (as if you don’t have a cruise-control feature) which may or may not be weaving…five’ll getcha ten that when we pull alongside you you’ll be engrossed in a phone conversation. We equate this with the fundamental inability to walk and chew gum at the same time.

You, like increasing numbers of drivers, forgot that the single most important task facing you was to control the vehicle. And it nearly cost you your life.

Cell phones have become a part of our lives; they’re not going away—nor is talking while driving. If you can’t “multitask”, though…park the car.

I don’t need you on my conscience.