You had a so-so day? All the more why you should celebrate it.

It felt like a spring day, though the temperature was mostly only in the high 40s.  But, it felt like spring because the weather often alternated between light to heavy rain and sunny blue sky just like it typically does in April and May.  And, mostly in sync with the weather, the traffic also alternated between speeds above the speed limit when sunny, and slower when rainy.

I, for sure, slowed down whenever it started raining. It is a case of once-bitten twice-shy. Even though it was a few years ago, I can even now so vividly recall being catapulted off the freeway at a pretty good speed, when the car lost traction.  In that fraction of time, all I could think was "it is ok if I die, but I don't want to be a vegetable."  And then the car struck a pole and came to a stop. The radio continued to blare.  I checked myself and not a damage to me. A lot of injuries to my car, which the aut repair shop took care of. Since then, my joke has been that both the car and the driver are damaged goods though we look awesome from the outside!

I am now a lot more respectful of the rain and snow and anything else.  I, thus, slow down when I think it is a must.  And, today, I had to more than slow down--I had to come to a stop.

Because, there was an accident on the road.

A vehicle was lying upside down in the median space.  Two ambulance personnel had strapped a person on the gurney and were getting ready to load up the ambulance. The highway patrol officers were talking with a driver of a car that was parked by the upside down vehicle.

And then my life resumed at normal speeds.

But, to the one in the gurney, if the person is alive, normal will be resumed only after a while.

I suppose that a minute or two before the vehicle rolled over, the driver could have been having a normal day. Perhaps an exciting day it was. Or, perhaps, he was complaining to himself or to somebody else on the phone about his dull and boring life. And then shit happened.  It was not a normal day by any means--if that person is alive to tell the story of whatever it was that happened.

With every passing year--well, even with every passing day--I understand more and more how fragile life is. The physical fragility. And then there is that emotional fragility. It is almost like we were born with a sticker, invisible however--fragile: handle with care.

But, humans that we are, we not only do not care for our own respective fragility, we even treat other lives with utter disregard.  We toss aside the emotions of others. We yell, scream, and curse at others. We cause physical harm to strangers, friends, family.

Apparently we need to be asked on a daily basis: which part of fragile don't you understand?