Honoring Halle ; A Mission to End Distracted and Impaired Driving

As I sat down to reflect on the essay questions provided, I was struggling to find the right words that truly help new drivers understand the importance of staying safe on the roads. I sat on my couch and pondered the question , why is this important to ME? Then it came to me — because I want to fight for a cause that took the life of my cousin.

February 27th, 2016. I was eight years old. After spending the night at my aunt’s house, my parents took me to Dunkin Donuts. The joy of getting breakfast with my parents quickly faded when my mom began to cry. Through her tears, she shared earth shattering news with me; my cousin’s boyfriend had crashed his car while under the influence. Both he and my cousin, Halle Schmidt, who was just 19, had died on impact.

As I heard those words at such a young age, I was unable to fully grasp what had just been told to me. I could not cry, I did not even cry at her funeral because I still had no clue what had happened. The perfect, family surrounded world that I grew up knowing changed after that day. I lost a part of my uncle, cousins, and every other family member. I lost a part of myself. This loss shattered my world, leaving me grappling with grief and the harsh reality that she would not witness milestones in my life. I could not fully understand why something like this would ever happen, but as I grew older, I began to notice the toll it had on my life.

Losing Halle was more than just losing a cousin; I also lost my role model, a future filled with countless laughs that was supposed to be shared with her, and a part of my childhood that I will never get back. She is never able to see me grow up into the woman she shaped me to be, never cheer me on at my biggest milestones, never give me a big hug when I am most in need of one, and never live the life she wanted to live. Instead, she died before she could even change the world. Her absence has left a deep hole in the Schmidt family that can and will never be filled.

As I matured, I have come to understand how fragile life truly is. Losing Halle made me learn how to deal with grief at such a young age, and showed me how just one bad decision can become your very last decision in a blink of an eye. If her boyfriend did not make the choice to drive illegally, then she would still be here to this day.

This realization helped me to grow as a person, showing me that I have to live each day to the fullest, cherish my loved ones while they are still on this earth and embrace being vulnerable. This has given me a mission, to educate young drivers in how dangerous reckless driving truly can be so that no one else has to go through what my uncle, cousins, and the rest of my family has gone through the past 9 years.

This is why driver education is so important, it shares stories, just like Halles, in order to not only educate, but make new drivers feel the weight of these tragedies. All it can take is hearing one real-life story to understand how your actions can affect the outcome of your life behind the wheel.

There are many steps that can reduce the number of deaths, but I feel that the most important step is to address distracted and intoxicated driving. The leading cause of crashes in teens is due to phone, drugs, and alcohol usage. By working to eliminate these things from our routines, less teens will end up like my cousin.

As a teen myself, I understand how tempting it is to check a notification, change the song, or text a friend back. But the more I think about Halle, the more I realize that no song or text is worth an irreplaceable life.

We live in a world that is built around our phones, but one thing that our life is not built around, reversing the consequences of a fatal decision. Accidents do not care if you are a good person, have a perfect life, or are working to achieve your dreams. A single moment of distraction is all it takes to end a life.

So what can we do? We can take personal responsibility. We can hold others accountable. We can call someone when we are impaired and can not get behind the wheel. We can push for better driving education that emphasizes the real life consequences of distracted and impaired driving. We can enforce more laws that give stricter penalties. But remember, no change can happen if the first change is not you and your actions.

No one needs to go through what my family has gone through. No family should ever have to experience the heartbreak of losing someone because of a small, irreversible decision. Every person that gets behind the wheel has a choice; a choice to drive responsibly, and choice to stay focused. Make sure that your own choice values your own life and the lives of others. Trust me, you never think that something like this could happen to you or someone you love, until it does. And once you get to that point, it is too late.

My cousin’s story is a painful reminder of what is at stake every time you get behind the wheel. But if sharing her story can save one life, then it is worth telling. All she wanted to do was help others by being a nurse. And she is still doing that even if she is no longer her. Through her story, she is changing the lives of so many teens and adults. No one should have to learn this lesson the hard way. Do not make a decision you will regret because once it happens, there is no turning back.