…as I put it a few days ago, this emptiness which consumes me like a cannon ball blast through my chest, with the impact forming it’s own black hole and I’m constantly being sucked into myself in an endless loop. I was rear ended on my way to school last Friday, and I can’t yet recall a time where I have been this haunted by an event. My suffering is both physical and mental; I’ve been having a harder time doing simple things comfortably such as sitting down or just twisting my neck to look around. But the crash itself lingers in the back of my head endlessly, it haunts me and I cannot escape the feeling of the impact, the sound of crunching metal and shattering glass and the sinking feeling my innards made when I knew my car had been sabotaged.
Of course, to the large majority of people this sounds far outrageous and exaggerated; many do not find a car is something important and/or worthy enough to be this depressed about. I realize a life is of far more importance than a vehicle, but there’s a flip side to this. I read something someone had typed awhile back and it’s a quote that really sticks to my mind.
“A car to most people is just that, a car. But to others it’s a work of art. Its yours, you fixed it, you scratched it, you made that stain on the seat.”
Too many people perceive a car as simply a piece of property. This has nothing to do with money to me; that car meant something, it had sentimental value and purpose. So many look at life in a big picture, at the long run, and end up thinking of many things as trivial. A damaged car is seemingly no big deal, it can be repaired or replaced. But how can one claim to be concerned with a bigger picture when the sum of it’s parts is tossed aside as unimportant? Think about a Picture Mosaic: from far away one may see the face of a smiling man, but up close the iris is a photograph of a tire, the eyelid a sunny beach, the nose comprised of family events. If every occurrence that comes along is seen as trivial, every event accused of being blown out of proportion, then nothing is of importance. The Picture Mosaic becomes a wall of black, a large picture of nothing, comprised of thousands of smaller pictures of nothing.
While tiring it has been, I don’t find my reactions to this excessive at all. I love my car and, being my first car, developed a strong bond with it. I now feel an emptiness perhaps reminiscent of what would be a dead dog or friend. True a car may just be a mechanical mass composed of metal, but don’t they have a greater purpose too? They transport around from place to place, shelter from the rain, heat up frozen limbs and cool sunned skin, offer a sanctuary of privacy. These are only a few examples of what I have found the meaning of a car to be, things which many probably take for granted. But, this was the first accident I’ve been in and hopefully I will be more prepared and emotionally stable for any loss in the future, should the need ever arise (hopefully never, though).
P.S. And hopefully my car will make a full recovery and the transgressor who damaged it and myself pays in full. I pray for Karma.
P.P.S. I really wish there was some sort of law or regulation for the manufacture of large cars. There really needs to be a standard for how high above the ground the bumper can be. I understand all you poor s.o.b.s need to compensate for something really tiny and so feel the need to drive a very large vehicle, but it’s really shitty when you hit other people and your bumper does not hit their bumper but rather THE BODY OF THE CAR ITSELF. It would be so much better If trucks and SUVs were not built 9000 feet above the ground and much more fair to those of us that don’t appreciate being hit by a tank. This makes me respect Europe so much more for it’s disgust at America’s love for big vehicles.
