5 seconds, Dad
In the span of 5 seconds yesterday, I had two very dangerous near misses. After work yesterday I was wasting time while Ali ran. I went to the pet store to get food for Tuki. I left by going down the alley behind the store and worked back around to the main road, waiting to turn right. It is a divided road, three lanes going in both directions, you can only turn right. It was right around five so there was a lot of traffic of course. I am looking to my left, waiting for a break in the rightmost lane of traffic for me to turn. Finally a small break shows up. I start to make my turn. As I turn forward and start to move, I see a biker, passing in front of the car, he just cleared my path. If I moved a half second earlier I would have hit him. Then, still shaken from the near miss, as I am getting into the lane, there is an idiot in the center lane that decides to cut over into the right lane to try to get ahead 15 feet. He obviously was paying no attention to my turning and spots it at the last minute and swerves back into his center lane. My heart rate jumped up another couple dozen beats from this second near miss in mere moments.
The biker incident was the same situation as about a year ago when I actually did bump a Mexican on his bike when I was trying to leave our parking lot. Yes, I suppose I should be looking the other way, but the natural reaction when you have one way traffic is to look the way that the traffic is coming from. These tards on bikes need to make sure a driver sees them before crossing in front of them. I mean it is just common sense. Incident two was just one of countless examples of bad driving that happen all the time in our area. Almost always the idiot involved is either a Haitian, a Mexican, an old fart or a person engaged in a cell phone conversation. I was freaked out about my near misses, thinking about the alternative ending was pretty unnerving.
My Dad is scheduled to roll in today at the end of his 7 or 8 day motorcycle journey from New Mexico. He has always liked doing long road trips like this. Shortly after my parents divorced, he took a cross country trip on his old Triumph motorcycle. He has driven cross country many times, he just enjoys it. I suppose I enjoy the adventure aspect of it as well, I just don’t do it very much. I expect to have a good time with my Dad. Our relationship is pretty good, now.
Over the years I had some rough times with him. When my parents split there were tons of depressing, sad times that I prefer to not think about. I was about 13 when they divorced and the following three or four years following that were pretty tough emotionally. My dad and I did a lot of fighting. Then after Dad worked hard to help me start on my college years, he blew up after I decided I was bailing on college after only three months. In my infinite wisdom, I had decided that college had little to offer me and I missed my girlfriend at the time back home entirely too much. I had some partial scholarship money involved and was supposed to play baseball there as well. I threw it all away.
Dad did not react well to my choice. I did not speak to him for a long time, somewhere around 6 months. Eventually one of us reached out, to be honest I don’t quite remember if it was me or him and we reconciled. He eventually accepted my choice and supported me, even as I plodded away in shitty jobs like cutting meat at the supermarket. For a brief time period I was basically working for my dad, doing stuff around his place that he didn’t have the time or the motivation to do. He talked about teaching me some stuff about the side business he ran, installing water pipes, valves and meters. (the same business ironically that my younger brother has now assumed) That didn’t materialize because I soon had decided on a career path in the computer industry. He again helped me there, helping me with the tuition for Lincoln Tech.
From there the rest is history, I finally established myself, became independent and was on my way to being a somewhat well adjusted adult. For a long time, I always felt like shit because I let down my Dad, I bailed out on the path he had laid out. However over time that faded and now I think in a way my dad is proud of me for finding my own way, without college and winding up relatively successful on my own two feet. We now enjoy each other’s company. I still don’t talk to him that much, but that is just because it is the way I am, I just don’t pick up the phone to shoot the shit, with anybody really.
As I have gotten older I have a better understanding and appreciation of my dad and why he may have done some of the things that he did. Hell I went through a divorce myself. It should be a good couple weeks with him in the house. Blogging will be sparse.