Be Forewarned - This One is Serious

How do you start a piece that involves the death of a friend? Maybe with a brief memory: “I still laugh recalling the time we each had to do four extra suicides for sassing our basketball coach. In our defense, he was wrong. We never should have run the full-court press.” Or how about a personal description: “She was a beautiful 25-year-old who loved people, sports, and animals and just had a real zest for life.” Or maybe with the newspaper’s headline: “Young Couple Dies in Tragic Accident.” As my shaking fingers enter these words, my heart palpitates and I endure my third day of stress headaches, I know I have a message I must send. I’m just not sure of the most effective way to deliver it…

A couple of days ago, my lifelong friend, Lindsay, and her boyfriend, Christian, were killed in an auto accident. The fatal accident is disaster enough, but upon learning the specifics, I become more upset. Lindsay and Christian were traveling to South Carolina to vacation for the week. While on I-270, around Frederick, MD, they encountered an aggressive driver. Witnesses reported obscene gestures being exchanged by the occupants of both Lindsay’s car and the larger pickup truck next to them. Suddenly, the driver of the truck sped in front of them and slammed his brakes. Christian swerved to avoid the collision and their vehicle ended up airborne, then the side of the road before hitting several trees and rolling the car. Lindsay and Christian were pronounced dead at the scene. The driver of the pickup truck never even stopped.

While I can sympathize with anyone who has lost a loved one in a car accident or one involving a DUI, road rage has never personally affected me…until now. We all know it exists; many of us have actively participated. It can be as simple as an excessive horn or flashing the bird, to tailgating or even following a car until it stops. But in this case, common ego-driven acts of road rage escalated into road violence and the death of two wonderful people. Therefore, I am using this week’s spot to remind everyone that our driving actions have consequences.

We are living in a world that appears to grow more impatient everyday. It's as if everyone has a destination they must get to NOW. Some people take egocentricity to the extreme and their disregard for those around them is disturbing. Tolerance is diminishing and anger management is becoming a lost skill. It seems that aggressive behavior is simply an accepted part of everyday living. All of these characteristics translate into inappropriate, and even belligerent, conduct on our roadways - especially the major highways.

I beg, plead, and implore you to think twice about your actions behind the wheel. Please do not reciprocate childish behavior, and certainly don’t provoke it. I don’t have the answer as to what calming method you should use, but if you begin to feel yourself losing patience, please take a deep breath, count to ten, put on some music, find your happy place. Do whatever it takes to compose yourself and be the more mature person. Not only might you be saving your own life, but also those of the people around you.

It frustrates me to no end to know this tragedy was the result of a senseless act that could have been avoided but was not. I am now without a friend. Lindsay's parents are without a daughter. Her sisters are without a sibling. All for what? To retaliate to a stranger’s highway aggressiveness, territoriality, and self-centeredness with more of the same? In two minutes that stranger has passed by and is out of your life anyway. Better to be the adult and act responsibly rather than possibly be the catalyst for road rage. Especially as one never knows when road rage will result in road violence and even death.