Apathy

People complain that I am too detached. Some people argue that it proves that I’m uncaring. Other people claim it proves I’m an ass. Still others insist that it’s just not right.

On my end, I wonder why those people think it’s fun and engaging to read so much into it. Especially when the alternative is so unpleasant. Take, for example, what I detachedly avoided while driving this weekend.

I was heading north from the airport on a major highway. Traffic was very light, but cars were very much present. The average speed on the four-lane stretch I was driving was about 5 miles per hour above the speed limit, or 70 mph.

I was in the second lane from the highway divider. Ahead of me, a white station wagon was in the speed (first) lane. Next to him, a red car was in my lane, matching pace. In the fourth lane, a grayish van was driving. All three of these cars were moving at about the same speed. The white car was roughly three car-lengths ahead of me. The red car was maybe three and a half lengths ahead. The van was about two lengths. Behind me, two cars trailed at five or so car lengths.

With the stage thus set, I noticed that the guy in the white car seemed to be searching for something in his passenger seat. Either that or he was pretending to give head to a friend who was not there. In either event, his attention was clearly not on the road as indicated by all the movement that I could see (even in the dim street light illumination).

Sure enough, a few seconds later, his car took a strong swerve to the right, towards the red car still next to him. He recovered, but still, I thought to myself something along the lines of, “I do not care to have any part of this,” and took my foot completely off the accelerator.

A second later, his car took a violent swerve to the left, towards the divider. The driver looked up, and apparently swerved a hard right. Directly into the red car beside him. There was a loud crunch.

Still slowing from before the crash even began, I casually checked my rearview and switched into the third lane. The white car had gone into a full spin out since the crash, and was in the process of making two complete turns about two car lengths ahead of me. That is, through the lane where I had recently been driving. A few seconds later, he would come to rest in the divider with a loud crunch. Meanwhile, the red car had swerved hard to the right since the crash, and was again ahead of me, very shaky.

I glided past the white car as a hail of glass shards bounced off my windshield. I changed back to my original lane just as the gray van – apparently scared out of its wits – crashed into the rightmost divider for no particular reason. A few seconds later, the red car more subtly bounced into it and came to a stop. Behind the pile up, the two cars that had been behind us screeched to awkward halts, but did not directly collide with anything that I noticed.

I resumed acceleration and was back up to 65 mph in about three seconds. I had caught a glimpse of the impacted red car as I drove past. The driver’s side door was crushed in. I decided that no intelligent police officer could possibly conclude that the red car was the source of the original problem. As a result, I did not feel inclined to stick around to play witness in the freezing cold. And frankly, I suspect that the grey van would be relieved I did not hang around to tell anyone that I was of the opinion that it had crashed through no fault but its own.

Traffic behind me came to a complete stop. Of the original six cars in the crash site, I was the one directly in the middle. I not only casually emerged from it on the other side – alone – but I did so with only some glass shards on my wiper blades to complain about. Everyone else was clearly terrified, hurt, damaged, or worse.

I am strongly of the opinion that had I been prone to emotional reactions, I would have ended Sunday evening as yet another car in that pile. Had I not moved out of the way on two occasions, I would have been in a spot fated for violent impact. Despite that, I strongly suspect that most people reading this will respond with a horrified, “How could you not be worried about all those hurt people?!” (Answer: “Because I’m sure one of the people that got trapped behind them when the road became blocked was motivated enough to call for help. And I’ll bet they did it a full minute before I would have, had I stopped a safe distance away and made the trek back.”)

So, if you must, come away from this story thinking that I’m an uncaring ass who just isn’t right. I’ll continue to ignore that opinion and focus on productive things. After all, it clearly takes more than a major accident and societal fury that I survived to slow me down.