Tuesday, Aug. 31, 2010
Wrong place, wrong time, not sure why
John Beaudoin, Journal Publisher
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I suppose there is some sort of universe balance thing going on here. Karma, chance, fate, destiny…whatever you want to call it.
All I know is, from now on, I will pay a little less attention to the ice cream and more on driving.
In the process of doing something nice on a Saturday night for my now 8-and-a-half months pregnant wife, I got into a little fender-bender with another vehicle. In the grand scheme of life, it was hardly anything to get worked up over.
I mean, a minor accident in a parking lot ranks pretty low on the list of things I need to worry too much about. The impending birth of my first child, paying bills, dwindling retirement savings and about 1,284 other things go ahead of the accident.
Still, it is just such a pain in the rear end.
Sure, the insurance company has been fairly easy to deal with. But the process is still in the early stages, so who knows what is to come.
Going through the accident again and again with adjusters, agents and claims people makes me thankful it wasn’t a traumatic event and that no one was injured. All in all, just a few dents that can and will be fixed.
The real issues are the intangibles that can cost us in the short and long term – time and stress levels.
I spent the better part of Sunday, the day after the wreck, playing “what if” in my head. What if I were delayed in the drive through line? What if I had left earlier or later? What if I had gone a different route home? That’s a game you’ll never win, for sure.
And I spent the other half wondering just why this happened, how I could have avoided it and what it all meant.
I also gave a lot of contemplation to those things in life much, much more distressing that happen to good people every day.
The routine car accident is not always routine, for sure. People get hurt. And sometimes time and stress lead to financial woes when we find ourselves at the wrong place, in the wrong time.
But how on earth do you avoid that?
I couldn’t come up with any answers to this Sunday. Or Monday. Or today, for that matter.
Destiny, fate, whatever you call it, I am really not sure how much of this life we are really in control of.
Thankfully, the ice cream, and I, both survived the wreck.
Because really, at this stage, just getting home alive and with what I was sent out for is really all that matters.
John Beaudoin, is publisher of the Blue Springs Journal. To respond to today’s commentary, call 816-282-7001 or e-mail jbeaudoin@bluespringsjournal.com.
