Car ding

I was on my way to see a hematologist about my low white blood cell count. I am still unfamiliar with Tucson, and found myself in a right hand turn lane when I didn’t plan to turn right. I signaled left to change lanes and a car politely let me in. We were at a stop light, and I didn’t quite manage to squeeze fully into the lane before we came to a full stop. There was plenty of room for the right hand turners to go by behind me, so all was good.

We waited at the stop light. Suddenly, the car behind me, the one who had kindly let me in, hit my car! Smack, right into the driver’s side door!

I was stunned. Why would he hit me after we were already stopped at a stop light? The light was still red. Was it deliberate? Was he frustrated with me for shoving in front of him? But I was sure he had let me in. Didn’t he? Or did I totally misread the situation?

I was so shocked at being suddenly hit on the door, right at my elbow, that I couldn’t immediately remember how to roll down my window. (It’s weird in a Mini, the window controls are on the dash, down and center where you’d typically control your air conditioning and heater).

Finally I got my window open and I was like, “Why did you hit me? Why did you hit me?” He replied, “I didn’t mean to! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! My foot slipped!”

Oh. By that time the light had turned green, so I pulled over and he followed me and we stopped to discuss what to do next. He was very apologetic. He told me his name was Angel and he didn’t have car insurance.

He was young, and he had a beat-up old car. I don’t think people should be driving without insurance, but at the same time, it’s more important to eat and pay rent.

He readily admitted it was his fault. Although I knew that if I hadn’t been at such an angle, due to changing lanes at the last moment, he would have just tapped my back bumper when his foot slipped – which would probably not have caused any damage.

The damage to my Mini was obvious, but just cosmetic.

I like my Mini Cooper but it’s getting old, a 2007. I didn’t want to call the police, and either (of course) did Angel. I just didn’t want to deal with any of it. I didn’t want to be late to my doctor’s appointment.

So I called John, who called Angel, and I left them talking on the phone and went on to my doctor’s appointment. Which turned out to be a rather nothing appointment, by the way. The hematologist said, yep, my white blood cell count is a bit low again. Nope, we don’t know why. Not much we can do at this stage. Have a primary care provider check it every so often and let me know if it drops further.

I only went because my oncologist referred me there, and I’m pretty sure the only reason he sent me was because I had been sent to a hematologist by my primary care doctor in Albuquerque at the end of 2019. That was immediately before my cancer diagnosis. My low white blood cell issue was forgotten when we found the cancer, because obviously the cancer was more serious. So I guess we were just going back and picking up that dropped thread. But it seemed like mostly a check-the-box exercise.

I had my appointment and went back home to our new puppy and lots going on. Three days later John had to leave for a 2-week trip to Albuquerque. I mostly forgot about the accident. I don’t even know if we ever filed an accident report. I guess not. I really didn’t want to mess with insurance claims and uninsured drivers and deductibles and appointments for car body work. I think we can just rub the red paint out and call it good. I don’t care that much.

Sometimes there are too many hassles in life to deal with all of them. Angel got lucky that time.

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