The Sunken Soul

Any city that you travel to, and stay for any given amount of time, you will say "People in Townsville do not know how to drive!!" And you'd be right.  People are so preoccupied with their own lives that they just let the whole "driving thing" become a subconscious act.  Cell phones, make-up, talking and making wild gesticulations with hands and arms, braiding long strands of hair (somehow), dealing with the ill begotten children imitating Tasmanian devils in the back seat, reaching for that last french fry that left the container and is hidden among the napkins, or better yet, the action that will ultimately kill me and be on my obituary--trying to get the pickle off the cheeseburger.

And yet, as I walk around the city of Dallas, I notice that people here aren't those kinds of distracted drivers.  The ones I see are those that are totally engaged in driving their car (or land beast, a large charging bull of metal and gasoline) and determined to get to their goal three seconds faster than anyone else, resulting in someone imitating Tron's light cycle (I wish I had one).  Swerving in and out of traffic, only to be stopped at the next light a foot in front of the person they just sped past.  Then, to make up for some inadequacy of their own, attempt to break inertia laws and speed off with their lack of mufflers roaring like a pride of lions feasting on an antelope.

Even this I can understand, especially if their sugar levels are low. Never drive when you're hungry, unless it's to get something to eat.  The true monsters of the freeway appear after it rains.

Dallas is particularly bad after it rains because of the refusal of officials to repair side streets prior to building the ornate bridges high over their fair city.  Thus, potholes and dips become small oceans after a thunderstorm goes by.  And being a simple pedestrian, just trying to get to the bus, I worry little about the rain coming from above, but rather the sloshing of water coming from the roadways by unaware drivers, or, as I suspect, by people who deliberately speed up (as I've witnessed first hand) to soak the walker before he can get his umbrella down parallel to the street.

The cartoons we watched as a child, they are full of illustrations of people getting splashed with rain water.  Movies as well.  It's a symbol of someone down on their luck, or more accurately, a depiction of the depravity of the human soul. It's the same monster that shows up in the "comments" section of most any internet article, the bully who mercilessly picks on the twitter account of a celebrity or, honestly, anyone, because they can, and they will get away with it.  For that driver is basically a troll, an anonymous face behind a window that drives off, never to be seen again.  Chances are the soaked pedestrian didn't get the tag number, nor the cyber-victim the IP address of the person who posted.  

What really ticked me off was a simply search on Youtube for "splashing people with a car."  There's a ton of them.  All people who decide to film themselves splashing people with rain puddles, on purpose, and then putting it on the Internet for everyone to see.  Because it's funny!! It makes you Cool!!  Well guess what, it doesn't.  I'm not going to put an example on here, as it will drive up their views, but you can go look if you want to.  If you want to put your sunken soul for all the world to see, go right ahead.  I will be wet on the sidewalk, but my soul will be on solid ground.  It will be yours that will be drowning.  I know Someone who can save you, if you will let Him.