A drive interrupted
It was late afternoon on a Sunday and I was a few miles from
home. There were no pressing needs, nothing to be done but get
home, walk out the trash cans, and heat the house. There was one
car ahead of me. We were both driving relaxed and lazy.
A drive interrupted
It was late afternoon on a Sunday and I was a few miles from home. There were no pressing needs, nothing to be done but get home, walk out the trash cans, and heat the house. There was one car ahead of me. We were both driving relaxed and lazy.
 I watched a car round the bend and approach us. It was a gradual curve. It was not a corner. But the driver still didn’t make it.
 His right front wheel stepped onto the loose dirt. The nose of the car dug into a small mound. The car catapulted. It returned to earth on its nose after flipping, then rolled three times. Parts sprayed outward – both bumpers and the rear window. The car came to rest against a utility pole.
 The driver in front of me pulled over. I pulled over. We were the only other vehicles within eyesight. We ran to the car. We reached it at the same instant. The other driver reached out his hand and, briefly, we shook.
 Then we looked inside. The driver was in one piece, his feet to the left of the brake pedal, his torso wedged between the seat and door, his shoulders and head on the back seat. He was unconscious but breathing. The engine was still attempting to run so we cut the ignition.
Beer cans were scattered all over the front seats.
 We called 911. Within 15 minutes civilization converged upon us. Fire trucks, law enforcement, ambulances, then a helicopter. It took 20 minutes to remove the driver from the car. On the stretcher, he moved his arms. He was driven by ambulance to the helicopter, then flown somewhere.
 I stood in a strawberry field with a Highway Patrol officer and told him what I saw. He told me the driver had “blown a .22.” The driver was three times above the legal limit for alcohol.
 I waved to the man who had arrived at the wreck with me, got into my truck, and drove home. On the drive home I felt nothing, but had a few thoughts. I thought about how, this time of year, it sometimes feels like everyone on the road is drunk. I thought about how a few inches of steering could have sent the car straight into the guy in front of me – or me – head-on.
 I thought about how it happens all the time, so much so that we don’t even react anymore. How we all know someone who has gotten it. How we read about it on a weekly basis.
How the statistics mean nothing. Like the fact that in single-vehicle fatal crashes on weekend nights, 72 percent of the fatally injured drivers over 25 are intoxicated. Or how the 2.6 million drunken driving crashes each year create victims out of 4 million innocent people. Or how, while 7 percent of all crashes involve alcohol, nearly 40 percent of fatal crashes involve it. The government keeps track of these things.
 I went home and took out the trash, ate food, fed the cat. Seeing a car flip, roll, and spray pieces like so much shrapnel did not knock me from my routine.
 It should have.
 I should have felt something more than indifference about the guy in the car. He has a family, friends, maybe children. People love him. Someone got a phone call no one wants to get. The monetary cost of everything involved in saving the man will change people’s lives. It was a powerful incident.
But I didn’t care about the guy. My only feeling was gratitude that he did not maim anyone else, including me.
 In the end, I suppose I did feel something. I felt like I didn’t want to be around drinking humans. And the thought of driving anywhere on New Year’s Eve sounds repulsive.
 I suppose running to that car and not knowing what we would find in the wreckage instilled a little something in us. A holiday spirit we could have done without, and should have.
