Crossing the Street

I realized today that perhaps my priorities are a little skewed.

I was on my way to work this morning. I have about an hour walk from my house to where I need to be for the making of the money. This morning, I was in decent spirits. It was raining but with the end of Daylight Savings Time, I had enjoyed an extra hour of sleep and I was enjoying some sullen, wintry melodies on my massive headphones.

It was kind of perfect.

I stopped to cross the street. I noticed an old Volkswagen van and its equally ancient driver sitting at the intersection, waiting for the same light as I was to turn green so the antique man could pilot his vessel across the same crosswalk I was waiting to use.

The light turned and both he and I headed for the middle of the crosswalk at the same time. I was watching him since I figured he hadn't noticed me -- judging by the fact that he was steadily accelerating to exactly where I was standing. I kept walking though, since the little white man told me I could. As I saw the dilapidated hippie bus approach me faster and faster, I thought, with a remarkable amount of patience, "He's probably going to hit me."

I felt no panic or fear. I only felt a sense of casual resignation -- the kind you get when you realize that you have to wash the dishes because you don't have anything out of which you can drink.  I imagined lying in a puddle of filthy rain water congealing at the side of the road, psychedelic patterns swirling about my body as the oils and other runoff from the road commingled with my blood.

"Poor guy," I thought as I imagined dying. It would really be rough for him, but we all make mistakes. That's how I would reassure him, I decided, while I was dying.

"Look, it was just an accident. We all make mistakes," I'd whisper to him just before expiring in that disgusting puddle. I wouldn't want it to be harder for him that it already was.

Fortunately, he saw me well before he got close enough for there to be trouble and he swerved slightly, missing me by at least 15 feet.

"Disaster averted," I shrugged.

But then I looked up and the white bearded man in his weathered fishing hat SHAKING HIS HEAD AT ME!

All the sympathy I had for the plight I knew he would've endured if he had killed me while I was crossing the street melted away and was replaced by a violent, white-hot rage. All thought of me expending my last breath to reassure the poor guy washed down the gutter where my body was not lying.

I stopped in the middle of the intersection, dropped my umbrella to my side and -- flailing my limbs like a marionette whose puppet master suddenly had a massive heart attack -- shouted, "It was my fucking light, asshole!"

Next time, I'm not even going to think about comforting him during my imaginary death with my theoretical last words! Serves him right.