Consequences of Reckless Driving

Each year more than 1.35 million people die in automobile accidents. That equates to more than 3.700 deaths each day. My best friend was one of them.

On January 15th of 2020, I and my best friend were carpooling to work. It was early morning; the roads were slippery because of black ice. My parents warned me to call off our shift, but I told them I would drive slowly and safely. I remember my best friend smiling as she got inside the car. As I was driving, we were blasting music and singing our hearts out. I needed to turn right on a busy road, the light was green, so instead of looking to the right to make no car was coming, I turned the wheel with no hesitation. Suddenly my car was spinning onto the center of the road. I hear a big honk. My body went into whiplash but fortunately, the seatbelt helped me stay in place. I looked to my right and saw Zaina had passed out. Her head was bleeding and as I called out her name, she wouldn’t wake up. The driver that hit us was in a big SUV, it crashed on the side of the road. The driver, unharmed, came out and told me that he was speeding, and as he tried to stop at the light, his car skidded across the road and hit ours. Later that day, my best friend suffered severe head trauma from hitting her head on the deck of my car. She shortly passed away in the emergency room.

4 years ago, when I was a sophomore in high school, I took driver’s Ed. There was one phrase my instructor would emphasize to make sure it was drilled into our eager and naive brains,

“Always pay attention to your surroundings, even if you have the right of way”.

That phrase slowly and slowly left my thoughts as years passed by and I got more comfortable with driving. It cost me my best friend. She was someone’s daughter, someone’s sister, and someone who had a bright future that was stripped away from her.

Every day I wonder what I could have done differently, and what steps could I have taken to prevent this accident. It could have started by calling off work because the roads were dangerous to drive on. Or not blasting music and paying attention to my surroundings. Or it could have been simply slowing down at the intersection, looking to my right, even if it was a green light, and then have turned. I could have noticed that the SUV wasn’t slowing down, I could have waited to see if it completely stopped before I turned that right. I will always have what-ifs for the rest of my life.

People hear about car accidents all the time, whether it be someone’s bumper that broke off, or their car got scratched up, and if a serious injury or death occurred from it, so many are desensitized from it that it became disgustingly normal to hear about. One of those people was me. I would see it on social media, on the news, or from concerned parents, but I never took much heed because I never thought in a million years it would happen to me. But it did, and the consequence of that car accident was my best friend’s life.

The dangers of driving, especially to younger people, need to be heavily discussed. Even in driver’s education, all I remember was me and my peers being ecstatic to finally be able to learn how to drive. My teacher and instructor would warn us to be careful, but we never thought we would ever find ourselves in alarming situations that adults would describe us to. One semester of driver’s education isn’t enough, I believe we need to continuously have different levels of drivers ed throughout high school that it becomes second nature to know about, such as subjects like math or English. Because if most states in America trust a 15-year-old, albeit having a capable adult right next to them, behind the wheel, then implementing a few years of practice and courses in driver’s education should be a priority in our education system. I will always take responsibility for my actions that day and will forever regret the choices I made. However, since then I have tried my best to protest and make aware to other people that car accidents should not be the norm, especially when it costs thousands of lives across our nation. Making it stand out to our youth, ingraining into younger generations that the dangers of being behind the wheel can have detrimental consequences, and some of those consequences one can never come back from. Whether it be from the news, social media, or family and friends, speaking out and talking about the huge responsibility and privilege to be driving can help people understand just how impactful their actions on the road can truly be for them and the drivers around them.