Your life? For a cel phone?
I read this in the paper this morning. What a sad way to go man:
June 7, 2007 DURHAM – A teenager drowned after jumping into a lake to get a cell phone he had dropped in the water during a fishing trip.
The victim was identified as Eddie Allen, 16, of Durham, said Wake County Sheriff Donnie Harrison.
Allen was fishing Wednesday in Falls Lake with Garrick McCollum, 24, who jumped in after Allen and started struggling. Another fisherman helped McCollum, but couldn’t help Allen.
Witnesses said Allen tried to climb a concrete embankment at the fishing area but couldn’t get out because it was slick with algae.
Harrison said he believes the drowning was accidental.
It reminded me of when I was 15 and just got my learner’s permit for driving. My grandfather (the very cool guy pictured above) took me out driving in his car. He is a retired Major from the Washington State Patrol and was one of the guys that put together the state’s driving course for the police officers (If I am remembering things correctly).
While we were driving around the winding roads outside Port Townsend, Washington, a squirrel jumped out in front of me. Grandpa must have sensed my brief panic and quickly said, “Just drive straight ahead. Don’t swerve.”
Sadly, the squirrel didn’t make it.
After things returned to normal a few hundred yards down the road, my grandpa said, “All the years I was in the State Patrol, I can’t tell you how many times I came upon car accidents where people lost their lives on the road trying to avoid something as minor as a squirrel in the road. You have to think to yourself, ‘What is most important?’ ‘Do I want to endanger my life by driving into the ditch? Just to avoid a squirrel?’”
That advice is something that has stuck with me to this day.
Who knows? Maybe that advice has saved my life on more than one occasion.
Only one of the great pieces of advice he has given me over the years by grandpa. Looking forward to his visit this fall.
