Car Crashes and Co-Pays

Last night Seth was involved in a drunk driving accident, in the which he was neither drunk, nor driving. At about 8:15 PM on his way home from church he was sitting at a red light. A drunk guy, driving through the intersection perpendicular to Seth, turned left in front of another driver. The driver could not stop, and hit our friendly neighborhood drunk driver, who was pushed in to Seth.

The driver responsible for the whole mess, tried to drive away but his car was no longer operational, nor was anyone elses. Seth got out through the passenger side, since the drunk guy's car was attached to the driver's side door. Him and the other sober driver approached the other vehicle and knocked on the windows to make sure everyone was okay. The driver and his passenger yelled at them that they were fine and told them to get away. Nice, right?

Then the passenger started to climb over the driver, an attempt to switch seats and pretend she was driving. My first question when Seth relayed this info to me was, "if she was sober, why wasn't she driving?". The answer? Because she was wasted, but apparently there was some reason it would have been worse for him to be charged with this DUI so they were trying to switch. Seth and the other driver stopped this from happening, and filled in the cops when they arrived.

The drunks were arrested, even charged with obstruction and resisting arrest, and whatever you get charged with when you try to play musical chairs with the guy who is driving. Luckily Seth got a hold of another youth leader who was still at the church, who was able to come and stay with him (in the freezing cold) for two hours of police reports, and towed cars, and then drive him home.

Everyone is okay, except for maybe the car. We are still waiting for word on that. Seth is banged up but mostly unharmed, as was everyone else involved. For that I am very grateful, but I get so frustrated with drunk drivers. This was 8PM on a Tuesday evening. A time when I am often out with my family. It is so senseless to drink and drive. Drink if you choose to drink. I have seen up close how much damage alcohol can cause in the lives of those who become addicted to it, but it is legal and you have the right to decide whether or not to drink. But your right to drink ends when you get in a car and impose your poor judgement on others. I consider myself to be pretty tolerant of all lifestyles and allow people to make their own decisions, until their decisions put other people in danger. Then I get really upset. No one was hurt and my hope is that this could be a good wake up call for them, but the fact that there was seat switching going on leads me to believe this may not have been the first time this has happened, and that they apparently just don't care who they hurt.

Alyssa was terrified this morning when I told her what had happened. But when people are drunk they don't think of the little girl who could wake up fatherless because of their selfish stupidity. Call a cab! Too harsh? Sorry, I just have so little tolerance for something that could be prevented so easily.

What's interesting is that Seth just saved us a bunch of money by replacing the mirror on the van himself so we shopped last week for my new kitchen table. We went a few times and when it came time to make the purchase I kept chickening out. I kept thinking that I should be grateful for the table I already have and just walk away. Is it okay to buy nice stuff sometimes just because you want it? Because my conscience always tells me no? Anyhow, I walked away and decided it was best to let the kids keep coloring on and destroying the table we have for a couple more years, and now my table money will pay my co-pay because as you might have guessed the party at fault was uninsured. Again, not how I wanted to spend that money, but I am grateful that I felt the prompting to leave that money in my account. And Julie's law lives on.

But my husband is safe, so you can take that new table Mr. Insurance man. I hope your kids don't color on it.