Safety and Kindness

For those of you out there who are impatient to the point of belligerence, please, please rethink your priorities!
It's time for the Summer break. Kids are running around instead of in school, so there's more foot, bike, and skateboard traffic. People are going on vacations, so there's more road traffic, and more of that traffic is huge (trailers, toppers, campers, Winnebago's).
Especially when we're behind the wheel, our attitudes should be geared more towards safety than the rat-race. Even if you have right-of-way, a vehicle is a powerful object. Even at slow speeds it can kill or maim. Saving a few seconds isn't worth risking life, limb, or even property.
I've heard arguments about, "Well, I have right-of-way!" I can only respond, "Even if you have right-of-way, will you really feel fine about running someone over?" Get real.
Even as a runner, I try to keep in mind that if I don't pay attention, I could cause a driver to swerve into someone else.
One of the attitudes that helps me have more patience is to seek opportunities to plant positive seeds of energy. What goes around comes around. The best tool towards safety is patience, but also kind, generous consideration.
We should be paranoid enough to make prudent decisions, but not so paranoid that it shuts us down.
Live life, don't just watch it.

Here's a very painful but ultimately inspiring post by Scott Dunlap...
Demons on Mt. Diablo

Here's another inspiring runner with a positive message...
Running story from Susan W. Love