Lawryde Ponders Causality, the meaning of Cheez-its, and why God is trying to kill him again.

As if God isn’t trying to kill us all at every given moment… but I digress.

My body is full of adrenaline right now, so we’ll start from the end and work back.

It snowed last night (less than a ¼ inch accumulation), and the sandbox at work is tucked away back in the country with only two country roads leading to it. I’ve lived in Illinois a touch too long apparently because every winter here I have an oh shit moment where I nearly get in an accident because I forget my Wisconsin winter driving skills. Luckily I have reflexes of a jungle cat (more on that later). The twisting winding road to work normally is really fun to drive at high speeds. So I’m kind of driving it the way I normally drive it. I come into a corner going way to fast and my ass end lets loose.

Oh shit moment begins.

I counter steer the skid, but my momentum keeps me going. The anti-locks are clicking and I’m counter steering the other way now. I’m facing the other direction and my car finally comes to rest about two feet from going into the ditch. The engine dies because I don’t push in the clutch in my moment of shit. I was lucky on two fronts. Number one I didn’t end up in the ditch because then I would have had to call a tow truck to get my ass out. I do think, however, that is covered in Hyundai’s roadside assistance program.

Where I am most lucky though is that a large semi carrying a piece of heavy equipment wasn’t coming the other way at that exact moment (a frequent occurrence on the road to the sandbox), or I would most likely be in the hospital right now or dead. Bottom line, I need to slow the fuck down and remember where I’m from.

Last night my wife and Carter and I went to see a specialist midwife. The only one within 60 miles is 60 miles away, so we took a ride through the Illinois countryside to see her after I got back from work. We stopped in Henry cause I had to pee. The boy had also run out of food and was hungry. I grabbed some Combos for myself and looked for something for him. I looked at the Cheez-its and had a Robert Frost moment of both Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening and The Road Not Taken. I paused a few moments and grabbed them.

We continued on in the dark. We were chatting, mostly Carter (he doesn’t stop) and I saw a deer in the right ditch. I slowed, but it was continuing to the right. My wife said something about how I was going to hit that deer. I didn’t see the second one that was coming from the left until the last second due to my concentration on the first who I thought was heading left. I mashed the brakes and I saw him stop and turn. We were going to hit him. There were no cars in the other lane so I swerved hard. The Elantra pranced to the side nicely. We barely missed him. My body filled with adrenaline much like it was a few minutes ago.

On the way home I began to think about my pause at the Cheez-its. If I hadn’t paused for them, would I have hit the first deer (unable to swerve or hit the second), or would I have been delayed a few seconds elsewhere and the same thing would have happened? I’ve talked before about how seemingly insignificant choices have massive impact on our lives. This was one of them.

Was it inevitable that I was going to miss those deer? Was I never going to get stuck in the ditch or hit by a semi coming the other way?

This is the center of my dilemma with life, death, God, and the nature of time.

Cue the music.