Before I begin, I will give you all a little back story on why I was prompted to write this particular piece.
As I was heading home from class today, my vehicle was hit by another vehicle. I was in the outside (right) lane, and the lady (in an SUV much larger than my wee-little coupé) was in the inside lane. So, here I am minding my business, ten and two, when I look to my left and a wall of white is drifting towards me. Now, this has happened several times before; walls of various colors drifting towards my small car. Usually, a honk sends the wall back into its lane. Today, no amount of honks could save me. The wall hit the front, driver side of my car going 40mph. She pulls into the parking lot closest to us, with me trailing behind… Then, she starts to leave the parking lot. She didn’t even realize I was behind her, nor did she realize that she had just crashed into me. I scramble to find my find my phone amongst all of the stuff that was thrown onto my floorboards because I genuinely thought she was about to dip out.
The first thing I do is call my dad, so he starts to head that way. She asked me if I was in college, to which I replied “yes.” Then she asked me if we could exchange info so she could go on her way. I told her no, I was going to wait until my dad and the police arrived (considering she all but left the scene of the accident).
Fast forward, a little bit. She tells me she simply did not see me, which really should’ve been fine. So I tell her plain and simple, “I tried to honk at you.” Do you know what she says? “WELL, there’s a blind spot you know! And YOU were in it!”
So, it is now my fault that I was in your blind spot, and you hit me. After all of the exchanges she says to the police officer, “Wait, so this is my fault?!”
And people wonder why some youth of today do not respect their elders. Of course with everything, there are exceptions. There are some very disrespectful people in my generation; I am not one of them. I was calm. I was mature. I was collected. There were a lot of things I could’ve said to her, but I held my tongue… as I was raised to do in such a situation. Here is a novel idea, just because you receive AARP newsletters in the mail, does not mean you are entitled to respect. If you are rude and condescending to an innocent student which you dang near traumatized, then tell me, why are you deserving of my respect? I could have called 911, read them the license plate and told them she was leaving after hitting me. But I didn’t. I gave her the benefit of the doubt and in return she attempts to insinuate that I am at fault. This is not the first time this has happened. I do not appreciate being looked down upon, simply because I am younger than you. I have utmost respect for my elders; but only those who treat me as the adult that I am. You do not get to blame your mistakes on someone else because believe it or not, your age is not correlated to your superiority within society. If you want to be respected, then show some respect. A moment of silence for common decency.
