Monthly Archives: December 2018

It Could Have Been Worse

Well, I just had a relatively shitty morning. But it could have been a lot worse.

I have a lot in my head these days – plenty that’s good (like starting a new business venture with another doctor), but quite a bit that’s not so good (relatives with health concerns, multiple friends with significant health crises in their families, a friend who just lost a sibling), and I’m a little tired. My brain is doing a lot of multitasking.

Our dog’s annual checkup/vaccine visit was scheduled for 9 o’clock this morning, and he gets very stressed out at the vet’s office (read: “wont-even-step-on-the-scale-so-I-have-to-lift-and-hold-my-60-ish-pound-dog-while-I-weigh-us-both-together-and-then-weigh-myself-and-subtract-my-weight-and-then-heaven-forbid-the-vet-should-try-to-look-in-his-ears”). So I started to think about how much I hoped he wouldn’t stress too much, took him for a walk, and seat belted him into the car for the 20-minute drive. Perfect timing, since it was 8:35 when I left the house.

Except it wasn’t perfect timing, because the freeway is under construction and they closed the exit ramp that I needed to take to get there. Not a huge deal – I’d have to take a later exit and wiggle back to get there from another direction – GPS would get me there just fine. I called the vet’s office to explain what happened and tell them we’d be a few minutes late – they said “no problem.”

Thought about friends’ family members. A few miles later, there was an open exit ramp. I took it, and started using my internal sense of magnetic north to navigate until the GPS recalculated.

Again, no problem. Cell signal was strong. Map was on the screen. The little blue circle representing my car was on the blue preferred route. I glanced down occasionally at the navigation as we made our way to the vet’s office. Thought about the condolence call we’d be making this evening. Thought about the website copy I needed to complete today. Thought about the talk I’d be giving tomorrow to the Science National Honors Society at the high school my boys graduated from. I had a lot to do.

And then the map shrunk down to a tiny little box in the bottom corner of the screen. No clue why it did that. Glanced down and tapped the little box with my thumb. Eyes back on the road. Thought about my friend’s father.Glanced back at the phone – map still tiny. Crud. Eyes back on road. Tapped at the tiny map square again. Eyes back on the road. Thought about the new business bank account I needed to open. Glanced down – map still tiny.

Of course, what I should have done was pull into a parking lot and figure out what my phone map was doing, but what I did instead was continue to repeat my same action while expecting a different result. I didn’t have time.

Eyes on the road. Glance down. Tap. Eyes on the road. Glance down. Tap. Eyes on the road – oh SHIT. The pickup truck in front of me was stopping because there was a bus stopping in front of him.

Slammed on my brakes. Hit him anyway.

We pulled immediately into the driveway/parking lot of a bank. It took all my strength to turn the wheel – the power steering was dead. I jumped out of the car as he exited his and asked immediately, “Are you OK?” “Yes, are you?” “Yes. I’m so sorry.”

The front of my 14-year-old minivan was hemorrhaging red liquid onto the ground. I started to smell something burning and realized I hadn’t turned off the engine, so I immediately turned it off. Our dog was sitting calmly in his seat.

Called the police. Stared at my bleeding car. Looked at the hole that was punched in my front bumper by the trailer hitch (now slightly bent) on the back of the other guy’s pickup truck.

And now there were no other thoughts intruding on the issue at hand. Nice timing, brain.

Police officer showed up, took our info, and was just generally really nice, as was the guy whose truck I hit. Called my husband, told him what happened, and asked him to call the vet’s office for me.

Called our car guy (when your family’s “fleet” consists of vehicles that range in age from 6 to 22, you have a car guy), who told me where to have it towed. Called AAA, who told me a tow truck would be there within an hour.

The police officer stayed until I knew the tow truck was on its way. He offered to drive us up to the vet’s office (about a mile away), but I needed to stay with the car until the tow truck arrived. The officer gave me his card and told me to call if I needed any help with anything.

A woman pulled into the bank parking lot to use the ATM. She saw me and asked if I was OK. I said yes and thanked her.

I called the vet again, and they said they’d fit our dog in whenever we got there.

After just a couple minutes, someone from the towing company called and said he had a truck nearby that would arrive within five minutes. It arrived within three. The driver was also extremely nice – offered to drop us at the vet’s office, but my dog did not want anything to do with going up the steps into the truck (and I was NOT about to attempt to carry him, struggling, up them – picture, if you will, a 60-pound bucking bronco with nails that need to be trimmed). So I paid the tow truck driver for the miles-beyond-which-AAA-covers and started the walk to the vet’s office.

I may not have mentioned that it was about 25 degrees. My hands were frozen. I stopped at a store along the way, where the employee kindly allowed me to bring the pup inside for a moment to warm up.

I may also not have mentioned that one of our other cars (the 1997 model) is in the shop, so My husband didn’t have a car at work. One of his colleagues lent him his car so he could meet me at the vet’s office and bring me home. His colleagues also changed the location of their afternoon meeting to be near where we live so that Doug could get there easily.

I still had to pick my dog up and weigh the two of us together and then subtract me, but he is fully vaccinated and healthy.

The collision shop has managed to find used parts for the bumper replacement. The red liquid was not coolant – I had just squashed and punctured the power steering fluid line. I should have a functional car back by Monday.

It could have been a lot worse. I could have caused an injury. The repairs could have ended up costing a lot more. Any of the people mentioned in this story could have been unkind.

So it allows for perspective. Because of my line of work, and because I and people around me are all getting older, I am frequently exposed to people’s sadness, worry, pain, and frustration. It can really get stuck in my head, because my drive is to fix it. And when it can’t be “fixed,” I still want to make it better. So sometimes I think about it more than is helpful. Sometimes, like last night, I lose sleep. Sometimes I think about it when I should be getting other things done, so I end up thinking about getting those things done when I should be thinking about the smart thing to do when my GPS screen shrinks.

Perspective. Priorities. I can’t let thinking about the big things get in the way of thinking about the little things, because a little thing, like driving to the vet, has the potential to become a big thing. Perspective. Priorities. Even when you can’t change what’s happened, you can change the experience of those it’s happening to by being kind. I called the towing company to tell them how helpful their towing guy was. I called the police chief to tell him how helpful and kind his officer had been. Perspective. Priorities. Allowing the stress of being late and of having things to do cloud my judgement so much that I thought it was reasonable to try to fix a GPS issue while driving caused worse issues than just being a little behind schedule and could have caused much worse still.

I’ll consider this a wake up call. And I hope that, if you need it, my morning can serve as a wake up call to you as well, so that you don’t need your own.