Pay Attention

After the last camp breakfast and hugs good bye we drove off from Washington Maine. Russ was driving for a very short first leg to the Rockland airport where he was flying out of. Thankfully he did not mind sitting at the tiny airport for a few hours watching the old bi and single wing planes flying in and out so Carter and I could get a good start on our drive home.

I took over the driving from there so Carter could spend the car time texting her friends. It turns out that was a good thing since about an hour down the road a girl driving a red SUV in the middle lane decided at the last minute that she needed to take a left hand exit just past the actual exit. Since I was in the left hand lane I was in the direct line of this clueless driver. Thanks to my constant scanning sense for bad drivers doing worse things I was able to slam on the brakes while taking the same left exit as the red SUV and just barley averted a total crash.

It was an incredibly scary moment. The girl in red realized her almost fatal mistake as we passed by her and she mouthed “sorry.” Carter burst into tears. I was shaken up to, but kept the car moving and circled back around to get back on the south bound route. It was a good learning moment for a new driver. Being alert to the dumb stuff other people might do is as important as not doing dumb stuff yourself. I am just thankful that I was driving because we only averted disaster because my reflexes took over. I drove the whole rest of the trip making our half way home hotel without any other incident.

Now that Carter and I are tucked safely in our matching double beds spending our last night sharing a room together for the summer I am having a moment to contemplate how lucky we are. I know that if I had been at all distracted when the girl in red made that bad move we wound have crashed into her going 60 miles an hour. I hope tomorrow’s drive will be much less eventful.