habu

Saw a recent local news report about a youngster who got into an automobile and not only started the engine but put the vehicle in gear and subsequently ran over and killed a sibling. The incident ended only when the vehicle crashed into a neighbor’s fence. The parents and grandparents were devastated. A neighbor, when interviewed by the bleed-lead roving reporter, could only shake his head and wonder how such a thing could happen. For me, the question was answered within 24 hours.

Elizabeth and I had planned that I would pick her up for one of our DAR-related outings, but as it happened, she was already out and about and at the last minute decided to come by here and let me ride with her. She pulled her car into my drive, but because we have two vehicles, there wasn’t enough space for her to pull in entirely, and so her car was catywampus across the sidewalk with the rear of the caddie sticking out into the street.

As I walked to her car, I noticed an SUV parked in front of my neighbor’s house. Two adult neighbors and a visiting adult woman were standing on the sidewalk, visiting woman handing money to neighbor woman.

Just as I opened the door to Elizabeth’s car, I heard the SUV engine rev, incredibly loud and horribly up close, and three adults yelling “NO!! NO!! NO!!”

Seems visiting mama had left a toddler alone in the SUV. With the motor running. And toddler, being a normal toddler, decided to play. And so he was out of the child restraint seat, and into the front, and then down into the floorboard, and onto the accelerator.

Standing there between the two vehicles, the sound of that engine roaring in my ears, my mind barely had time to register what was happening, much less consider a means of escape.

I threw myself into Elizabeth’s car and slammed shut the front door. Now, frankly, a Cadillac is one of the better made cars on the market and heavier than almost all other passenger vehicles, but that one door would have provided very little protection if the SUV had rocketed forward.

Looking in that direction, I saw SUV mama pull the curly-headed tot out onto the sidewalk with her. Oh, by the way, mama did not kill the engine.

Elizabeth looked at me with ashen face (probably only a shade or two lighter than my own), and we just sat there for a minute, both of us shaking with a combination of fear and relief. I don’t know what she was actually thinking at the time, and I honestly don’t remember my thoughts for those few seconds, but finally, she looked at me and said, “I guess we better get out of here before they really do run us over.”

And that’s how it can happen, just that lightning quick, just that potentially lethal. I can see the headlines now - - SUV morfs into habu.