a moment of realization is worth a thousand prayers.

driving to the factories a few days ago there were four of us in a van. i would never tell my parents how unsafe/scary/not-modern the highways that we drive on are and the vans that we ride in. there are multiple accidents daily involving pedestrians, bicyclists, and vehicles. this is not a good part of china. this is not glamorous. 

we were driving about 80mph, maybe faster, and we were heading straight into stopped traffic. tour buses, cars, the traffic is unreal here. we're flying down the highway, and though it happened quite fast, my boss calmly said, "dude, is our driver awake????" and before i could even look up, he was leaping from his chair in the middle row, screamed, and shoved the guy on the shoulder; just in time for the driver to slam on the breaks. we skidded into traffic, came to a swerving, careening stop. all four of us in the car were completely silent, completely calm.

it was over in about 30 seconds.

i went over about 25 scenarios in my head. what if it was me sitting in that seat with my head turned talking to tom behind me, as it was most days. what if tom had never noticed he was asleep. what if we were all resting our eyes too on these early mornings after these long days. what if we'd hit a bus going 80-90mph in one of the poorest parts of china, in one of the most unsafe vehicles i ever ride in.

we all got out of the car calmly. all four of us knew what had just happened. we had plenty more laughs the days following, we were able to work just fine, but there was a total awareness of how close it was to having a very altered, severe outcome.

xo,

cw