
Name: Tomas
Votes: 0
Regulation for Restoration
The world is a twisted and dark place when looking at it from a wide lens. The amount of death and destruction that goes on all throughout the earth is unimaginable and unbearable to witness. The application site for this scholarship puts that into perspective. The yearly death rate of motor vehicle accidents is equal to or more than any war ever waged besides World War II and the American Civil War. The problem is that most of these deaths aren’t out of malice. These deaths are “Accidents”, hence the name. The amount of innocent death that goes on yearly puts into perspective how dark the world can be. When someone dies of an accident they become a mere statistic. Powerfully I state, I almost became one of these statistics.
I was in sixth grade at the time and ignorant of safety measures. I was walking to school and jaywalked in order to get to school a bit quicker. I remember seeing fireworks in my eyes, feeling the ground not underneath my feet, and my hip taking a large but numb blow. Luckily, I was not dead. “Is your car alright?” I said after being hit. I was strictly yelled at to stay on the ground by a passerby because I was in shock. I was fine, I knew I had no broken bones and luckily the shock took away any pain from the initial impact. Fortunately, I was a bit of a chunker as a child so I’m sure my fat deposits absorbed some of the impacts as well.
In my mind, I was absolutely fine. I told the people around me that I didn’t even want an ambulance because I knew that ambulance rides were expensive. It’s funny how I was educated on the costs of living but not the rules to stay alive. The bystanders didn’t listen. When the ambulance arrived I walked in and talked to a guy who worked in the ambulance. I remember saying “I got hit by a car and my hair still looks great” and him chuckling at the joke. Humor, greed, and compassion were all qualities I had absorbed through my life but that all and more could’ve been taken away from me because I did not absorb the instinctual response that everyone should have to “look both ways”.
Now when I am in a car with someone who is driving recklessly or takes an abrupt stop I get a large hit of adrenaline to save myself from impending peril. When I have to cross the street on foot, without a crosswalk, I make sure the street is deserted before I even think about walking into the road. When there is a crosswalk around and I must cross the street I look in every direction, I make sure everyone can see me while I cross. Sometimes I ride my bike in the street and now that I am older sometimes I cross busy intersections with the assistance of traffic lights. Even when the traffic light is green and I am “safe” to go forward I use my no handed biking skills to wave my hands around in the air while I’m crossing the street so that everyone knows I am there. The anxiety I face when I am around roads is immeasurable.
Sometimes a funny story to recall is my interaction with a motor vehicle on that day. The reactions of “i got hit by a car once” give me solace and peace with that time. Deep down I have strong emotions in relation to that day. Whenever I am near roads a PTSD like reaction is felt from the back of my mind. If only traffic rules and their importance were taught to me from a young age. Real life horror stories of children or people being told in young grades may be effective to help children understand the severity of the road as they grow older. Bringing in firemen who are present during first response emergencies to lead an assembly may have helped me. Last, another option to help kids understand why traffic laws are important is to educate young children in the art of common sense. Have games, stories, and films integrated into young kid’s lives to test and teach them about real world scenarios. Traffic laws are meant to be understood, signs look like what they mean, teaching kids to analyze and infer about their surroundings may be the best approach to helping save lives across the world.