God is merciful...oh, and I almost killed a man

Mornings for me are usually rough because I'm not a morning person. Grogginess is my total mindset. However, this morning, from almost the minute I woke up, my mind rewarded me with a wonderful playing of "Shadow of the Day" by Linkin Park, a peaceful ballad. The song worked itself into my mind and soothed my grogginess. It filled me to the point that I shut off my car radio as I climbed behind the wheel to head to work.

"The shadow of the day will embrace the world in grey..." was the refrain setting my mind at peace and focusing me on the road in front of me when I noticied a bicyclist 100 yards ahead of me. I noticed him, because he kept looking over his shoulder, wobbling each time - once as the car in front of me passed him, twice to look at me, three times as I got much closer. A motorcycle and two cars were coming in the opposite direction with a little spacing between them. As I approached the bicyclist, my serenity-elevated alertness caused me to watch this guy more closely. I noticed his tires twitch a few times as I got nearer, like he was an amateur who had too many other things to focus on other than where his tires were aimed. He was in my lane going in my direction - another sign that he was an amateur biker.

So I'm cruising along at 30 mph with my eyes glued to this guy. I try to time my passing of him for a small break in the oncoming traffic, so I can give the bicyclist as much extra room as possible. When I'm within 20 feet of him, I slide over into the other lane a smidge. Just as I do that, the bicyclist turns left, directly across both lanes of traffic and right in front of me, apparently turning into the lane that intersected our lane.

I slammed my brakes. I swerved. My tires skidded. Thank God for anti-lock breaks. (I was in our Intrepid, so stopping time is much greater (when measured in inches) than our smaller car.) The biker did not turn his head to see me until he heard the tires squeal. Now this took less than a second, but still.... Anyway, he freaked and turned his bicycle wheel parallel to my adjusted path. His momentum and my momentum carried us into each other. However, our adjustments meant he only received a glancing blow to his front bike tire.

The truck in the oncoming had enough time to stop to let the biker, who was still on his bike and had not been knocked over, pull back across the road and climb off. I waited until the truck passed us and pulled over to the biker and asked if he was okay. He said, "You hit my damn bike!" He said, "I had my arm out like this" and held his left arm out in the gesture of turning left. I said I did not see his arm, not mentioning the fact that I believe he did not raise his hand to signal a turn. I thought it best not to argue blame at that point, considering he was probably in shock from nearly dying. He repeated, "You hit my damn bike!" I said I realized that. I asked him if he was hurt. He looked like he wanted me to protest innocense and get mad at him, but I did neither. He said he was not hurt. I looked at his bike, which appeared to have no damage to it. So I looked him in the eyes and said "I'm sorry" and left when his body language appeared to accept my apology.

As I stated here, I had watched him very closely for 100 yards because something about his handling of his bike was making me nervous. I never saw his arm come out, and while he was talking to me, I noticed he was holding a partially full plastic shopping bag in his other hand - yet another sign of an amature bicycle operator. So holding out his left arm while controlling the bike with his right hand which was holding something would have been very difficult.

Anyway, I nearly killed a man, which is pretty traumatic for me. Yet, my mind was at peace prior, so I had clarity and focus not grogginess. My reaction time was nearly instantaneos because I was wary of him. I had no huge spike of adrenaline to use up because, as a good driver, I was as prepared as possible for him to do something unpredictable.

And the song continued in my head afterward, almost as if it was ordained by God to be my companion to sharpen my mind for what He knew was coming and to reassure me afterward. I could not have been more ready to avoid the biker than I was. Praise God!