To the Punk Who Almost Ran Over My Baby with a Car

This is an open letter to the punk who almost ran over my baby with a car in our very own yard. Did you bother to stop to see that my baby girl who was standing right there in our own front yard when you squealed up into our driveway after doing a u-turn in the middle of the street? Would you have even cared if she was alive? I wonder.

I invited my nieces to drop in for a visit this afternoon because their mom had a bad headache and I thought that they might be a little tired of having to tiptoe around the house. Plus, I thought my sister might appreciate a little break from worrying what they were up to or that when she was able to hold her head up without pain that she would walk into the kitchen mess from hell….

I drove over to her house after sending a text message to the older of the two girls with the invitation. The cell hadn’t hit the table before it buzzed with a YIPPPEEEE message in return begging me to hurry and come over to pick them up! Surprisingly, they didn’t even ask what we were going to do in the way of entertainment.

After I washed the girls’ faces and checked to see if the youngest ones were dry (for the moment) we proceeded toward the car and I started buckling the little ones into their respective seats. My sister only lives a couple of miles from my house so I buzzed right on over to pick up our visitors.

Once I arrived, I wanted to check in on my sister without having to go through the car seat routine once again. I got my nieces to go ahead and get in the car to play “I Spy” or something else while I slipped into the invalid’s sick room to give her a kiss and tell her to feel better soon.

The day was pretty average until the punk who almost ran over my baby with a car entered my world. When we got home I pulled into our driveway, the girls helped me get all but the littlest one of our group out of the car and then I heard squealing, squalling tires and the girls screaming.

I spun around only to see your rapidly approaching vehicle speeding up the driveway and then if that were not bad enough, you wrenched the steering wheel to the right to do yet another u-turn in our driveway. Never mind the fact that my daughter was standing frozen, still as a statue in the yard.

I know that you saw kids running all over the place, but you never even hit the brakes. You just slammed the car in reverse and let the transmission take over which is amazing given the rate of speed you were traveling.

There was no look of alarm at what almost happened on your face and no apologetic look. My daughter came far too close to being a statistic and you seemed to be anything but sorry.

Just so you know, this letter is my way of letting it go. I’m sending it out there so that I won’t waste time being angry at you. Well, I’ve typed and spell checked and I’m still pretty steamed at you, the guy who will from this day forward be known as the punk.

I would like to believe, that you had just gotten dreadful news and that you had no choice but to play fast and loose with the lives of my and my sister’s children and that you weren’t just being a selfish self-centered little shit with no thought for anyone but yourself. I hope that you taken the time to say a prayer to thank God that He spared you from the worst that could have happened.

I know that you, the guilty party, will never read this but maybe someone who does will stop and think how to maintain control at all times and THINK! As it is, a careless jerk ruined our afternoon BUT if a child were killed or hurt it could have ruined many lives.

I apologize that this post had nothing to do with going green but I just had to get this off my chest. Thanks for listening.

Here's a video that I would like to dedicate to the punk who almost ran over my baby with a car.

KIDS and SPORTS INJURIES

Kids and sports injuries have always fit like a hand in glove. In my neighborhood there is always a child getting hit by a ball, breaking an arm at football practice or spraining an ankle. As the mother of four girls who love to play cheerleader and tumble, the news that school gym injuries are jumping in numbers gives me cause for concern. The reason given for the increase is that schools are pushing kids to get up off their butts and get some exercise in an effort to DECREASE the numbers of obese children. And I’m all for getting kids off the couch and away from too much television not to mention preventing them from wearing out their little hands playing video games but get a load of these numbers and wait for it because there’s a shocker in the numbers.


In a recent study the numbers from a study on kids and sports injuries from the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System from the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (is that a mouthful?) were the big tip off. For the period that covered eleven years, over four hundred thousand kids were injured during PE (physical education or Phys ed as we used to call it in the dark ages) and taken for treatment at the emergency room. This number increased 150% over the course of the study. The largest number of injuries was associated with six school activities. Not surprisingly, the usual contact sports were culprits. Of course, football and basketball are on the list and I would have been amazed if they were absent. And there were a few of the less physical sports on the list like soccer, gymnastics and volleyball. But then, hold on… RUNNING is on the list.


I ran junior high track and then went on to high school so I paid my dues as did many of my friends and frankly I can’t remember an injury or sprain that couldn’t be iced down on the spot with the athlete sent limping to the sidelines to rest up. My question is this, have kids gotten so out of shape that they can’t even run without having to hit the ER?

Please leave your comments or experiences regarding Parenting Kids and Sports Injuries before my oldest leaves for kindergarten!