2018

2018 was a year that changed my perspective of driving.

In 2018, I experienced my first ever car crash while inside the vehicle on the passenger side. My father and I were going home after one of my baseball practices, and my dad lightly pushed on the brake on a stoplight. A man that was two cars behind us was texting his mother while driving and hit our car and the car behind us. I was terrified because everything happened exceptionally quickly, and I experienced a bit of whiplash from the accident. I look up to see my dad getting out of the car to see the damage that occurred to our car, plus the car behind ours. The car behind us had a lady that had a baby in the back seat. Her baby was screaming at the top of his lungs, and the damage to the car was very evident. The trunk was almost torn off, the bumper was halfway off, and one of the backlights was missing. Lucky the lady and her baby were alright, and everyone was injury-free from that accident.

The following car crash that I have witnessed was when my mother and I were driving on a beautiful Friday afternoon from school. We were jamming out to some music while on the road, and a truck in front of us started to lose control. That truck flipped many times right in front of us, and all the groceries were flying out in every direction of the car. Once the vehicle stopped scanning, my mother and I hurried to see if the driver was okay. As we approached the completely flipped truck, we noticed that the driver had already crawled out as if his car didn’t just flip eight times. He also had purchased a boatload of groceries and appliances, which were now all damaged. I overheard the man talking to others, saying that he got distracted on his phone while driving.

Over the years that have passed until the present day, I have noticed that some of my family members and friends drive pretty irresponsibly. My family and I take a road trip to Destin, Florida, every summer. My uncle goes to Florida, and my cousins move around Destin during our stay there. I realized that the text and drive almost throughout the entire duration that they cause. It can be scary at times because they may get distracted to the point where they start to veer off to the side of the lane that we may be in. There have also been many instances where we almost crashed due to them texting and driving, or another person was too busy on their phone that they almost ram into our car.

I genuinely believe that some of my family members need to take more precautions when driving any vehicle. I have had conversations with family members that I considered irresponsible drivers about the importance of safe driving and the consequences of their bad decisions while driving—texting. At the same time, driving is not the only action that could ruin someone’s life because drunk driving could also be dangerous. Two of my cousins have been in at least one car crash. One of my cousins was going in the feeder while going home. Some ignorant person decided to drink while driving, and it caused a massive accident with my cousin. This crash resulted in my cousin’s car getting completely trashed, and she also had a massive cut that ran down from her knee towards her ankle. It was shocking to hear that news from my parents, but it relieved when I heard that she was okay. Another one of my cousins got in an accident while driving to her friend’s house. As she was going, she noticed a raccoon that decided to run right in front of her car as she was passing. My cousin decided to steer off to the side where there were trees, and she hit her car directly into a tree. Thankfully she was fine and didn’t have any injuries.

This last example of an accident that has happened is sad and dark. When I was younger, the mother of my sister’s friend was driving home after a long day out. She went on this bridge that is extremely high and is dangerous if someone doesn’t drive carefully. A lady was drunk driving behind her, and they unluckily both got on the bridge simultaneously. As they get to the top of this bridge, the drunk lady bumps into the mom’s car, which sends her crashing over the bridge onto the busy street below. The drunk driver continued to drive off even though she had just changed many people’s lives in the mother’s family. As the first responders investigated the scene, they found the drunk driver’s license plate that fell off during the crash. If they hadn’t seen that plate, the culprit wouldn’t have been found as soon as she did. That family lives changed in an instant due to reckless driving and ignorant choices.

Driving is an exceedingly dangerous thing that people do every day. As a society, we must learn and practice driving carefully and helping one another make the roads a safer place for everyone. I also believe that there should be many more laws for texting, drinking, or any fatal distraction while driving to make the road even safer for people’s everyday use.