Yellow Lights & Left-hand Turns

🚦
Yellow lights.
Left-hand turns.

I’m afraid of them now.
I approach an intersection and the light turns yellow.
My heart starts beating.
My eyes dart back and forth.
It’s too late to slam on the breaks but that means I have to go through the yellow light.
My knuckles turn white as they grip the steering wheel.

I watch the car facing me in the left-turn lane. Hold my breath.
Will they turn? Will they stop?
I tap the breaks, wondering, “Will I make it through?”

We were going through the intersection when the light turned yellow.
A car traveling the opposite direction turned left in front of us.
He didn’t see us coming.
It totaled the van.
After four weeks, injuries from that accident led to the night of May 23.
When Jason suddenly couldn’t breathe.
He died 8 hours later from a sudden massive hematoma. A large collection of blood in his lung cavity.
We didn’t see it coming.

📸 This picture is of the training video we were filming right before we got in the car that day.
A Friday night date to the Avengers movie.
Exactly one year ago.
The last Friday in April.
The evening of the left-hand turn.

Yellow lights.
Left-hand turns.

It’s getting better but I’m still afraid of them.
So, I’ll just keep slowing down as I approach an intersection, watching for the yellow light.
I’ll just keep going out of my way to find a place to turn right instead of making that avoidable left-hand turn.
I’ll just keep being cautious before turning at the yellow arrow in the intersection.
And I still choose mercy for the kid who turned left on a yellow arrow.
The one who didn’t see us coming.

Yellow lights.
Left-hand turns.
Caution. Care. Mercy.
💛