Thanksgiving 2020

 Outside our living room window this morning, we both heard a god awful screech.  We looked outside and a man in a white car is, very dangerously, doing wheelies in the parking lot of our neighboring park.  He is driving speedily, and then quickly jerking the car in another direction such that some wheels come off the ground and the car, when it rights itself, swivels dangerously.  It is pouring outside this morning. He is racing near a path where we and neighbors often walk. Nearly always there is at least one parent with a baby carriage strolling on the path.  If this was a mild day, the crazed driver could and likely would cause a horrific tragedy.

So what prompts someone to do what this man is doing?  Here is how I deconstruct it. Quite possibly just a wild guess not on the mark.

The fellow wakes up on Thanksgiving. And he believes he has nothing to be thankful for. He is alone, his spouse has left; his children away and not concerned with the dad.  In the midst of COVID he spends his days in a small apartment with no real place to go.  His job looks rocky if it exists at all. COVID has resulted in downsizing and he is living on the edge of solvency with bills coming in that he does not see how he will pay. The people in the next unit play their music too loud, and the noise from their frolicking children reminds him of how empty is his life.  He recounts all the bad turns he has taken to bring him to where he sits.  So, with these negative thoughts coursing through his head, and nothing to do, he gets into his car on a pouring rainy day and drives recklessly in a park where skidding could cause him to smash his car into a brick refreshment stand near the baseball field, the fence for the tennis courts, the pole that supports the basketball hoops, or something, God forbid, human.

The chances are his world is not as bleak as he thinks it is when he gets behind the wheel, but that is the way the head works when one event tumbles onto another on a holiday and one is feeling sad, disrespected, and useless.

Sad to consider this scenario.  But an opportunity to be thankful for all the blessings we have, and maybe an opportunity to reach out to someone who you fear might be having a similarly bad day--particularly on this COVID Thanksgiving.