Earlier this week, I witnessed a terrible scene: a body lying motionless on the ground while a Good Samaritan administered CPR. Perhaps you heard about the event, where a woman was killed by a pick-up truck on West 130th while helping a bus to back out of a dead-end street in the pre-dawn hours. At first, I could not figure out why traffic was stopped so early in the morning. I'm sure I swore out loud for my rotten luck at getting stuck behind a bus. It wasn't until I came upon the accident scene that I realized a by-stander was directing traffic. Yes, a by-stander. I must have arrived within minutes of the actual accident because no police or emergency crews had yet arrived. I have to say that the adults on the scene were handling things with far more control than I would have been able to muster.
Yet at the time I did not quite know what had happened, or what the end result would be. It wasn't until later in the day that I learned that the victim had passed away, while her child (some reports said two of her three children?) was on the bus that was backing out, and therefore witnessed their mother's death. I cannot even begin to fathom the horror. Then the following day, I learned that her husband had passed away about a month ago, leaving their three children parent-less in the blink of an eye. It is almost too much for my brain, and my heart, to process. I pray that the children have family who can take them in and that God will bring them comfort and peace.
I do not know why the driver did not see the woman, though I can easily see how a number of circumstances conspired together to form this tragedy. It was certainly dark, the street lights are not prominent in that area, the side street is not far from a crest in the hill (possibly creating a blind spot), and heaven only knows why the hell a bus is pulling down a dead-end street and requires any person to be in the middle of the road to get it back out. And, maybe, just maybe, was the driver momentarily distracted?
I am clearly speculating, as I don't know, and won't ever know. Yet it is that split second that haunts me. How many times have I looked down to find my cell phone, access the snack in the console, or perhaps check out the mapquest directions on the passenger seat? But for the grace of God, any of us could easily have been the driver of that truck, who is also most definitely in need of my prayers.
Frights like this tend to make us all diligent for awhile, into we are lulled back into our bad habits. My final prayer is that we all do our best to be attentive, defensive drivers.
