The Ripple Effect

At any moment, or perhaps at every moment, we have a choice, and our choices can start a ripple to create either positive or negative change.

A few weeks ago, Mike and I went to Cliff’s for ice cream. For those of you who are not familiar with western Morris County in New Jersey, Cliff’s is an institution. They make their own ice cream and on most summer evenings there's easily dozens of people waiting to order. It’s absolutely worth the wait.

It was spur of the moment, and we decided we’d take my car and Mike would drive. When we pulled up, we saw the place was packed. It had rained really hard a few hours before, and a stretch of parking was flooded, which made it seem even busier with not as much parking available. We circled around a little before we found an angled parking spot by the picnic tables in the back of the property.

Before continuing, I should mention that Mike is a car fanatic. Wherever we go, he tends to park his car as far away from others in order to avoid dings from opening doors, shopping carts and whatever else that may come from people being careless. He has said that he generally hates parking lots, but he also hates valet, so unless he’s willing to stay home all the time (which thankfully he’s not), he deals with it.

I should also mention that I really love my car. It’s a 2011 Subaru Legacy. I bought it used from a dealership because it was only a little over a year old and it had low milage. It has climbed steep hills in the snow to get me home safely. It has provided me tremendous savings because it’s so fuel efficient. It also has cool upgrades that the first owner installed, such as nicer floor mats and puddle lights under the doors so I don’t get my feet wet when stepping out. It’s closing in on 100,000 miles, it has a few minor scratches and it’s approaching some sort of major repair that Mike has warned me about, though I couldn’t tell you what it is. Regardless, I love my car and I’m bummed that likely in a few years I’ll need to replace it.

Mike tucked the car deep into the angled parking spot at Cliff’s and skirted it away from the car next to us. There was a tree on the other side, so no car could park next to it. Another one of Mike’s strategies—find an end spot and park as close to the edge to avoid any possible contact with the car next to it.

We walked up to the front of Cliff’s and found the shortest line in front of the eight windows that each had a teenager taking orders. These kids knew how to hustle, because we only needed to wait about five minutes before we had ice cream in hand and smiles on our faces. Since all of the benches and picnic tables were wet, we decided we’d enjoy our ice cream in my car….even though that generally goes against Mike’s rule of eating in the car, but perhaps since it was my car and not his, it was okay.

It was about 9:00pm when we finished. The gentleman that Mike is, he took my cup and left to go toss our garbage. Just then, I remembered a cute picture of my cat Gizmo that I wanted to post on Instagram. I pulled out my phone and tapped on the app just as Mike was getting back into the car. He started the car and I was in mid-post when we heard a loud BANG and I felt myself jostling forward. Of course, I screamed.

Because I was so engrossed into my post, I didn’t know what happened at first. Then I realized we weren’t moving. Then the dreaded realization that my beloved car was hit. I didn’t want to know the damage.

Just as I got out, I saw the black car that hit my back bumper pulling away. “HEY!” I yelled in my female warrior voice, which tends to come out in heightened situations and which was nearly followed by my newfound female warrior body, which felt ready to leap onto the car to stop it from leaving the scene. “Get back here! You just hit my car!!”

A tiny voice squeaked from the driver’s side window, “I know! I’m so sorry! I’m just going to park.” She pulled ahead into her space.

The voice sounded young. I noticed the Kyleigh’s Law sticker on the license plate. For those of you who aren’t familiar, it’s a small bright orange/pink sticker that’s placed in the upper left corner of the license plate and it indicates a new driver. This law came to be when a young girl named Kyleigh, who lived just a few towns away, was killed in a late night car accident where she was the passenger in a car with unexperienced drivers. Just after I noticed the sticker a young girl timidly got out of the car along with her equally timid friend. The driver nervously approached me.

“I’m so sorry!” she said. “I don’t even know what I’m supposed to do. What information do I give you?”

Mike was already shining a light from his phone onto my bumper. Amazingly, there was no obvious dents, cracks or scratches. He felt along the bumper. “There’s no damage,” he confirmed.

“I’m really sorry,” the girl kept repeating.

Immediately, the warrior in me calmed down. Thankful that no one was hurt, neither car was damaged and the girl was apologetic, this is roughly the conversation that followed.

“You’re a new driver?” I asked.

“Yes, I just got my license a few months ago,” she replied.

“It’s ok. I’m sorry I yelled at you before,” I said. “I thought you were leaving. The good news is we’re all ok and the cars are ok. Next time just be a little more careful.”

“I will,” she assured me. “Again, I’m really sorry.”

We helped her back out of the parking space and she slowly rolled out of the parking lot.

Just as I was getting back into the car, a voice came from the car next to me.

“She was probably texting,” an older man said to me through his rolled down window, his wife watching from the passenger seat.

That made me pause. “Did you see her texting?” I asked.

“No, but you know at that age….” he reasoned.

Now I found myself advocating for this teenager, who was out with a friend getting ice cream at 9:00pm on a Saturday. There’s so much worse she could have been doing.

“You don’t know that. She merely backed up into my car,” I sternly rationed. “It called an accident for a reason. I remember when I was seventeen I wasn’t the greatest driver.”

“That’s true,” said the man’s wife. “I guess we were all that age at some point.”

“Exactly.”

Mike drove us home without incident.

The next morning, I told my friend Lisa about what happened and she reminded me of the ripple effect that occurred that moment. She believes that thanks to my reaction, this teenager may carry herself differently when she finds herself in similar situations, and perhaps the older gentleman may be less judgmental about young adults. I could have continued yelling at this teenager and gone off the handle, but what would that have led to? Unnecessary drama.

And frankly, there’s WAY too much drama already in this world.

I’d rather put out ripples that are rational and calm than ones that are dramatic.



PS - This picture of Gizmo is what I was posting on Instagram.