Human Drama

I live on a fairly busy one-way street. Every now and then I see car accidents outside of my window. Today was one of those days. My boyfriend shouted at me from across the house that there had been a car accident and one car had flipped and was pinned between the light pole and the car below it. He grabbed his shoes and was leaving when I told him I would call 911. Since he has some medical training, he went straight to the scene. Since I don't have as much control of my emotions when emergencies happen, I went down the street. I stood in the middle of the road and directed traffic away from the accident. About 15 minutes later, a police car drove up and parked across the two lanes of the road. He quickly thanked me and I went back to the house (toward the accident). From my front yard, I searched for my boyfriend in the crowd and saw that he was still assisting people. I then noticed the crowd.

You see, while directing traffic, I noticed a few people on foot walking toward the accident. This is nothing extraordinary because there is a grocery store near there. It wasn't until I was entering my house that I noticed that the same people whom I had assumed were going to the grocery store were standing on the corner staring at the emergency team and the wreck. They had not witnessed the accident. They were not calming down the victims or helping in any way. They were just watching. It makes me feel sick. When I was 10 years old, I was in a car accident with my mom. We were on a busy road early in the evening. I watched as cars in the other lane slowed down to look at me, the totaled minivan, the other car, and, worst of all, my mom being put on a stretcher. I was doing my best to stay composed until my dad arrived. The medics and police were wonderful. The medic who drove the ambulance let me sit in the front seat and chatted with me. However, I couldn't help but see out of the corner of my eye those cars. They weren't trying to pass, they intended to stop and see what had happened.

Why do people think that this is an acceptable response to an accident? Those people they are watching aren't actors. This is a real tragedy in the victims' lives and they want to treat it like a TV show. I hate it.

However, there is a silver lining. My boyfriend just informed me that there were also multiple people who immediately jumped out of their cars to help. A worker from the grocery store jumped into the flipped car without a second's hesitation. Even though the gas tank was leaking and had created a pool under one car, they were under and on the car trying to wrestle out the passengers before the weight of the car injured them further. In the end, there were no fatalities but more than one person will be staying in the hospital today. I just thank God that for all of those people who stop to stare, there are still many that will do everything they can to help.