The Crash

Imagine you are a fifth grader in the back of the family’s car. Your mom just dropped your dad off at work, and now she’s dropping you off at school. The car is important because your family are all on different sides of town during the day. Your family has minimal money and lives paycheck to paycheck.

Now imagine you’re at a stop light in a school zone. The school bus in front and your car are both bright yellow. The day felt completely normal. You’re zoned out thinking about the essay that’s due soon at school. A distracted driver suddenly hits the car’s rear end and pushes the hood of the car under the school bus. Everything happened so fast. You feel something hit the back of your calf that scares you. You’re just a kid, so you don’t know better and start crying. The distracted driver blames the sun getting in her eyes for her mistake. Later, she does admit to speeding recklessly in a school zone.

This very scenario happened to me. I followed my mom over to the car behind us and watched a woman covered in glass cry about how she couldn’t feel her legs. I saw her from the waist down paralyzed with shock. I feel lucky I didn’t watch anyone die that day. Physically everyone made it out fine, with just some minor bruising.

For years after that accident, I couldn’t sit in the front seat of a cars. I would have anxiety at the thought of being in the front. I lost the trust of other drivers on the road. When my ex-boyfriend started driving, I would have nightmares about getting into accidents while I was in the front seat. I’ve taken my time to study for my permit since I’m still nervous about being on the road.

I believe in safe driving because cars are essentially heavy and deadly weapons if driven incorrectly. Motor crash vehicle deaths are on the rise, so cars being a weapon couldn’t be more true. Generally, the rules of the road are all common sense. Driver education is still important to inform motorists about tips and laws that their intuition might not know about.

Safe driving can boil down to the driver being aware of their surroundings and communicating with other drivers. Any kind of impairment can hinder driving performance, it unfairly gambles with other people’s lives. Being tired can have the same effect as alcohol. In both instances, it can slow down reaction time. The driver’s judgment would be impaired too. Increasing risks of accidents and incorrectly assessing situations. Speeding is a large problem, being the most common offense. Speeding is going above the speed limit. Increasing the risk of losing control and flipping the car. Phones are a fairly big problem too. On top of an internet addiction, a driver can completely miss signals. When drivers take their eyes off the road, even for 5 seconds there can be dire consequences. Voice-activated controls on phones could be dangerous too. A driver could talk over a siren or alarm. All of these things are illegal, and being caught doing it will most likely result in a fine or jail time. Driving dangerously just isn’t worth it, for both selfish and caring reasons.

Driving safely is being aware and using signals. Assuming roads are in ideal conditions, following the speed limit should be the maximum a driver should go. If road conditions aren’t ideal then drivers should increase the distance between cars. Reaction time is important. A driver being alert and awake will decrease accidents. Constantly scanning the road is important to not hit pedestrians, bikers, and other cars. Always assume that kids are going to run out in front of the car. Some kids have poor judgment and think they’re faster in cars. Drivers should make sure they are paying attention the whole time, and not multitasking. If a driver is falling asleep at the wheel, a twenty-minute nap on the side of the road would be completely reasonable. Signaling and being predictable to other drivers is just rational. Driving under the influence is so disrespectful to people on the road. Taking out a phone to order an Uber, or asking someone to call a taxi is so easy.

Taking simple safety precautions would allow so many more people to live. When there is more driving education easily accessible, there are fewer deaths due to crashes. Deaths due to crashes are so easily preventable, but not everyone takes the steps.