WORDS FROM W.W. November 4, 2018
It has been a deadly year in Colorado Springs on the roadways. Last week the 45th fatality this year occurred. It is the most since 1986 and we still have two months to go.
In the majority of the deaths, whether it be of a pedestrian or cyclist hit by a car, a vehicle losing control and crashing, a two vehicle collision, or a motorcyclist dying, speed and/or alcohol has been involved.
The roadways have become so treacherous that one of the head police officers has made several appeals on local newscasts pleading with drivers to slow down.
I now think about the dangers of driving on two of the main roads close to our house, Powers Boulevard and Research Parkway, every time I get behind the steering wheel. Last May a man in his testosterone-laced pick-up truck decided he wanted to quickly cut over two lanes and he clipped the back driver’s side panel of my CRV.
“I didn’t see you!”
My CRV is midnight blue…and it wasn’t midnight! Thankfully, a lady saw what had happened and she stopped to let me know it. He was found at fault and, hopefully, is now paying as much each month to his insurance company as he is for his truck super-payment! I’m not bitter!
We need a “speed fast”! Kinda’ like fasting from chocolate during the Season of Lent, we need a fast from going fast. We need to take the pedal off the metal.
Speed has become ingrained in our culture. We’re like sugar-hyped elementary students the day after trick-or-treat. For example, there’s a growing movement to speed up the game of baseball. People say it’s too slow, as if that’s a bad thing! Most teams in football now have the “hurry-up” offense.
I tell the basketball teams I coach to slow it down and players look at me like I’m looney!
Stores start trying to rush us to Christmas long before the aisles of Halloween decorations are gone.
We tell our grandkids that they are growing up too fast! TV commercials are now 15 or 30 seconds long so the business has to QUICKLY sell their product! We’re told that we have too much to do and too little time!
It’s an addiction! We can’t slow down! I’m going to suggest that Starbucks serve Decaf one day a week, but not tell anybody!
A speed fast…yes, that’s what we need! Like when I was growing up and we had phonograph records. We’d play the record at a slower speed and be amazed and amused by how we could make the Beatles sound as they sang “Lucy In The Sky”…slower!
In the Bible a fast usually refocused a person on the mission ahead, the source of life, and separated the important from the unimportant. It was kind of a cleansing event, like a reset button. Things that we thought were essential for life suddenly were seen with new eyes, and other parts of life that were thought to be excess baggage were seen for how utterly essential they were.
A speed fast. I’m slowly inhaling and exhaling as I say it.
I think I’ll take a long, slow walk today.
I think I’ll sit and read the newspaper, put my feet up, and read a book.
Maybe Carol and I will go and see the movie “First Man” about Neil Armstrong’s slow first walk on the moon and watch a story about a time past where things seemed to be slower.
I think I’ll take a nap and listen to Classical music!
I think I’ll type with one finger! Oh, wait! That’s how I type anyway!
I think I will stay off of Powers Boulevard and Research Parkway!
Words from WW Blog 