Dear Brave Ones,
Give it to m straight—Have you guys ever done this? Please tell me you have!
Carry on,
xox
As I wove around the corner, snaking my way slowly down the hill through the canyon to my hike this morning—I spotted it.
Something wounded or dead right smack dab in the middle of the road.
Immediately my heart sank a little and my body tensed as I straightened in my seat and turned down the radio in order to get a better look. That is essential. My eyes see better in complete silence and the days of multi-tasking are over for me. I can barely drive and apply mascara anymore. I used to be a pro. Now I suck.
Besides, the music was too cheery, too hip-hoppy, for such a morbid scene.
I craned my neck like Gumby or someone equally bendy to get a better look. From a distance, it appeared to be an animal. With black fur. In a pool of blood. Something larger than a cat and smaller than a dingo. Perhaps it was a skunk or a possum? They never seem to get the memo explaining how paved roads known as streets—filled with cars—lead to death.
It was often out of view, hidden by the other cars as we wound our way, bumper to bumper, to our respective destinations.
That’s when my monkey mind took over. This was a living creature. Cut down in its prime. Maybe it was a mother scavenging food for her babies in the dry brush of the drought-ravaged hillsides. Single mothers can never catch a break!
It was someone’s baby. Another animal’s friend. They had frolicked and played and in all of the excitement, it had forgotten to look both ways. It was then that its luck had run out. Splat!
There it is! I could see it again. Is it moving? Oh, dear lord, no!
Why aren’t people stopping?! Someone needs to take it for help, or drag it to the side of the road at the very least!
I’ll do it!
I was quickly working myself into one hell of a lather.
When I get close, I’ll stop my car and block traffic in order to access the animal’s well-being. Someone must! I decided.
If you hear of the murder of a woman in yoga pants in the Hollywood Hills by a mob of angry commuters in Friday morning gridlock—it’s me.
When the poor creature came back into view it looked to be lying still. “Oh thank God it’s dead”, I muttered aloud. That is not a sentence that feels good coming out. It is something you never want to hear yourself say. But I meant it. It looked like its suffering had ended.
“Why the fuck is everybody running over it?” was the next thing I heard my mouth say. Because it was true.! Forget stopping, no one was even swerving to miss it. In their rush to get wherever they were going, they were running directly over the poor thing.
I don’t care if it’s a dead possum. Swerve around it all of you accomplices to murder!
It was disrespectful, to say the least.
The time of reckoning had come. Ten minutes had passed and I was almost upon it.
Do I look and ruin my morning?
Or do I turn my head and look away?
Do steal a quick glance and say a little prayer?
Or do I stare and gross myself out?
I looked. Right at it. And I tried to swerve to miss it but I couldn’t without dying in a head-on collision—so I did my best.
Thump, thump. I cringed.
The right side of my car ran over it at the exact moment that I saw what it was, this roadkill that had sabotaged ten minutes of my morning.
It turned out to be a pile of black socks on top of a red sweater!
I know what you’re thinking and you’re right.
Carry on,
xox
