I ran over a squirrel on my way home from church.
I saw it crossing the busy state route a few hundred yards ahead of me and thought, great, I'm going to have to watch a squirrel get creamed. But it crossed in front of me and the car in the left lane, so I figured I at least was safe; it was going to duck under the guardrail on the median and die over there.
But no. Just under the guardrail it got scared and ran back the way it came. Right under my wheel. There was nothing I could do to stop it; braking wouldn't have averted the disaster in time and I ran over it yelling "No--no--no" and as soon as I felt the crunch I burst into tears. I looked in my rearview mirror -- never look in the rearview mirror -- and saw it crawling around in the middle of the road and thought I was going to throw up. I didn't even kill it. And the highway was too busy for me to pull over, back up, and finish the job out of mercy.
I sobbed like a child the rest of the way home.
I hate hurting things. I was the girl in grade school who carried dead birds home to bury them. I have always understood roadkill, and I have always grasped the concept of the necessity of death in the world as it is, but I have never been reconciled to being an instrument of that necessity. I never hit anything before I moved to Indiana. Now I've killed two animals -- one huge mother of a raccoon and this poor, stupid little squirrel.
I want my mom.
3 comments:
I hit a dog once, a big dog. Came over a hill and there it was, couldn't do anything. That was about 4 or 5 years ago, and I still can't get over it. I drive that same route a few times a day, everytime I remember the dog, a Golden Retriever. I need a Kleenex.
I hit a dog once, a big dog. Came over a hill and there it was, couldn't do anything. That was about 4 or 5 years ago, and I still can't get over it. I drive that same route a few times a day, everytime I remember the dog, a Golden Retriever. I need a Kleenex.
Sorry for the double, it said it didn't take the first time.
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