Observations while sitting and waiting for a parking spot.
OK Picture it, it's after work your on your way home and you decide to stop at a big box for that must have Chinese import, while waiting in another traffic jam in the parking lot you spot someone walking to their car, you move into position and click on your turn signal to let the world know this parking spot is yours. The person gets into their car and after what seems like two years decides to back out, at one point you catch yourself wondering if the person died or if they are just screwing with you; as this now unchallenged parking spot is becoming available the driver backs out about two feet and then stops as if it dawned on them that they should look in their rear view before taking that first leap. Just as the driver does this a family walks behind the car, as if controlled by some videogame mathematics. While this whole event takes place you just sit there and watch it like some horrible reality TV rerun, the first time you saw this episode you wanted to leap from your car to warn the pedestrians about their impending doom but as the years pass and you start to see it more and more this urge to help like so many others has faded.
What makes a person do such a thing?
Do they not see the car, because they are multi-tasked to the max?
Do they not care for their lives?
Are they on some power trip?
I can see that when someone is on their cell phone or when they are texting, their attention is not present, it is with the person on the other phone or with the message being smart typed.
People have very stressful lives and walking behind moving cars may perhaps be a suicide cry for help or it could just be that they are bored with their life and they want some excitement, I don't know.
People also have very large egos, perhaps their ego is bigger then the car so to their ego they are more important then a 2,000lb piece of machinery rolling at them.
I can understand all of these reasons, but one thing that upsets me most is when I see someone allow their child to walk behind a moving car and then not even react!
Something else we have to consider, cars are a tool and because we rely on this tool so heavily we perhaps have become too familiar and too relaxed around them. I am not saying we should fear cars just that we should respect them.
If you have no idea what I am talking about and you think I am crazy "people don't just walk behind cars!" then put your cell phone down for a minute and pay attention to what happens the next time you are in a big box parking lot, or any parking lot for that matter.
You never know, you may be the one who is walking behind cars and you didn't realize it before!
