THE MERRIAM-WEBSTER online dictionary defines a jaywalker as someone who crosses "a street carelessly or in an illegal manner so as to be endangered by traffic."
My own personal definition is somewhat different.
Given a rather recent and disquieting event, I now consider a jaywalker to be a woman with long brown hair who was too rushed or lazy to walk to a proper crosswalk but willingly risked her neck — and my peace of mind — by sprinting across a busy multi-lane street directly in front of my car.
I have no idea who she is but this woman has, for me, become the living (thank goodness) poster child of silly pedestrians.
How she almost ended up connecting with my car’s left front bumper is a mystery to me.
But my very amateur crime scene analysis suggests that before her mad dash and before my left turn out of the parking lot that day, she must have been standing in the blind spot created by the metal between my windshield and the passenger window.
I have no clue about what happened to her after her narrow escape. By the time my heartbeat slowed down to a rhythm compatible with life, she was gone.
Because it all happened so fast and I was so rattled, I don’t imagine I’ll ever know what truly happened that day. I’ll never really know who was responsible for what.
However, I do now know that my car’s brakes work very well and that my reflexes are snappier than I ever imagined they could be.
I also know — am fairly certain, at least — that if I had harmed the woman in any way, I wouldn’t have been held responsible.
After all, there is no pedestrian crosswalk in front of the strip mall on Cumberland Drive in Cole Harbour, which is where all this commotion occurred. And there is a full intersection, with crossing lights, less than, I would estimate, 30 metres from where the incident took place.
A quick scan through the Nova Scotia Motor Vehicle Act makes it quite clear that "a pedestrian crossing a roadway at any point other than within a crosswalk shall yield the right of way to vehicles upon the roadway."
Given all of these things, I don’t think I’d have been held legally responsible if my recent traffic misadventure had ended in a less lucky way.
Unfortunately, I can’t be sure of that. Even if I were sure, it wouldn’t make me feel any better. If my recent traffic misadventure had ended in injury or tragedy, no amount of legal absolution would have helped me sleep better at night. I guess that’s why I’m so critical, so disparaging, of the mystery woman jaywalker who so rattled my nerves last week. Even now, after calming down and grudgingly admitting that I am also guilty of jaywalking on occasion, I feel the need to chastise her.
She scared me. I’m mad at her. Unlike so many others I see jaywalking everyday, she got caught in the act and it affected me.
Even though it’s probably not fair, she’s the one to bear the brunt of my anger in this instance.
Like I said before, I have no idea who she is. If I had hit her, I know I would have spent a lifetime dealing with regret and remorse.
And that would have been a much scarier and harsher punishment than anything the legal system could have thrown at me.
Brenda MacDonald is a freelance writer living in Cole Harbour.
