Life goes on

On the way to a late lunch/early dinner (lunner?) Sunday at Carrabba's, it was a caravan of three: my parents in the lead, me in the middle, and my brother and his family bringing up the rear. We were driving in the outer lane of highway 64 east, and in a heartbeat a deer ran out from the median onto the road. It was not aiming for me, but rather my parents' car. Which means that a) I did not hit it, but b) I got a front-row seat for the unfortunate action. The deer followed what I assume to be a similar path to the one that hit me six months ago. Ran into the driver's side front quarter panel, then ricocheted off the rear door. Perhaps due to the speed, the poor doe went flying pretty high in the air, doing some awful flips, eventually landing at the left edge of the inside lane. I was expecting my dad to pull over right away, but he didn't. I assume he was stunned into proceeding. You know--when something terrible happens, and you don't quite know how to react, so you just keep on. I did it too--didn't pull over until I regained my wits. We did eventually pull over, the entire caravan on the side of the road. I was rather shaken up, having witnessed from afar what I'd only imagined happened that night back in November. But you don't expect this kind of thing on a bright, beautiful spring day. The script calls for darkness, or at least ominous clouds. But the thunderstorms of the previous evening had cleared, and the rain made everything smell clean, and the sun was shining on the bright green grass and trees. An innocent creature wandered where it shouldn't have, and it was a fatal mistake. I am grateful the only casualty was the deer, but at the same time I am uncomfortable dismissing the deer's life as expendable. My brother was my hero for the day, running back to where the deer lied motionless, and pulling it off the road so that it would not continue to be hit by more speeding vehicles. What's so bizarre is that after the police report, we went on with our day as planned. Continued on to the restaurant, waited for an hour, got booster seats and a high chair, dipped bread in olive oil, cut into chicken, spooned potatoes, guzzled caffeine, shopped for digital cameras. It never ceases to amaze me that life goes on. But it always does. Certain events feel like they should make the world stop turning, or at least change things, even if it's just a little, but no.