Jerks behind the wheel are dumb and dangerous

Friend of mine named Bill Sites told me a story.

He was coming home one evening and had stopped at a red light. When the light turned green, he looked to his left just in time to see some pinhead run the red light and barrel through the intersection.

He just stared at the guy and then, still with a green light, started across the intersection.

He never made it. He was broadsided by another pinhead who, apparently, believed that the basic rules of traffic didn’t apply to him, either.

Bill was pretty shaken up, but he wasn’t hurt. His truck, however, was totaled.

I bring this up because running red lights seems to be becoming a bit of a problem these days.

People are in a hurry and decide to push the envelope a bit. After all, it wasn’t really bright red. People are on cell phones with their brains wrapped around whatever it is that just absolutely needs to be talked about now. Whatever.

It’s a situation that’s getting worse, it’s dangerous and it just got personal.

On a recent Friday, I’d loaded up my truck with the remains of our 20-year-old deck and headed for the waste transfer station near Paine Field.

It was about 4:30 in the afternoon and I was stopped at a red light waiting to turn left onto Airport Road.

I watched the light turn green and glanced left to make sure traffic was stopped. The cars in two of the three lanes were stopped and there were no cars in the center lane. I remember looking at the driver in the car stopped nearest me on my left. He was wearing a white shirt and had both of his hands on the top of the wheel. Funny, the details you can remember.

I looked right and saw that traffic was stopped in the three lanes across the way, so I started out – and then, there he was, doing 40 to 45 mph, coming through that gap in the center lane to my left.

I got on the brakes faster than ugly on a mule and began a recitation of phrases I haven’t used since Vietnam.

Minor aside: I’d like to thank whoever designed the brake pedal on my truck because, if it’d been made of anything less than whatever steel it’s made of, my footprint would still be imprinted on it.

The guy never slowed down. Meanwhile, I was trying hard to clear him. Almost made it, too.

It was a light bump but, when he cleared my truck, I could see a large dent behind his right rear wheel and a very black streak in the same location caused by the vinyl on my front bumper.

He fishtailed once and high-tailed it to the next intersection where he made an immediate right and sped off.

I pulled over and found that my front bumper had been pushed in about an inch and had some gray paint on it. The car behind me pulled up and the couple inside gave me their names in case I needed witnesses.

I waited around for about 10 or 15 minutes to see if the guy would return. He never showed up. I called the sheriff and asked if I should wait at the scene. After explaining that there was neither major damage nor injuries, I was told I could go home and that an officer would come by later to take a statement.

She did, and afterwards, I sat down to think about all of this. Here are a few things I’ve come up with.

Pinheads abound and many of them are: (1) behind the wheel, and (2) in a hurry. Knowing this, even with a green light, it’s a good idea to check both ways. In fact, check more than once. In further fact, it might be best to just wait until the next green light before you start across.

I knew everything I needed to know about this guy’s character in about the time it took for him to get to the next intersection and turn. Backbone of an clair would be high praise.

Good people are everywhere. The couple who stopped to make sure I was OK will have my thanks for a long time to come and there are others like them everywhere.

I couldn’t tell how old the driver of that late model, gray/silver minivan/SUV was, but if there are some parents or maybe a wife out there wondering how their new car got that big dent and vinyl scrape, you might give me a call. I think I can explain.

One last thing, in case that driver’s reading this.

You know those traffic cameras they have at a lot of intersections nowadays? Guess which intersection has them?

Sleep well tonight, my friend.

Larry Simoneaux lives in Edmonds. Comments can be sent to larrysim@att.net.