For the Thanksgiving holiday this year, my house trekked north back up to Virginia to spend some time with my side of the family. Such was always something I was pretty ambivalent about in the past, but ever since I had kids, I do feel that there is some importance in having them have connection with my side of the family, not to mention try to build relationships with the litany of cousins they have, as I did growing up.
Overall, it was a very good trip, and I’m happy to have spent a good bit of time with my sister, cousins and parents, but most of all, I was happiest that my kids got to spend time with their cousins and my family members and be able to build relationships and connections with family that they don’t get to see too often. My happiest memories looking back on the trip were seeing my kids playing exuberantly with their cousins, and I’m thankful for my niece, nephew and the kids of my cousins all being so good to my children, and I’m optimistic that they can have a similar upbringing to my own, where the cousins all were pretty tightly knit growing up.
However, an introduction like this doesn’t happen if there weren’t some things that weren’t positive, and unfortunately for this holiday there were some bad things that definitely put a damper on things.
Firstly, to cut to the chase, I hit a deer while driving, and my car suffered a nasty crack on the bumper as well as the headlight assembly. I was driving along a road that I’d driven thousands of times in my life while living there, and I’d never seen deer on this stretch of road before. I was probably going no faster than 25-28 mph while accelerating when the deer popped out of a grassy median and it was so bang-bang fast that I was a good 200 feet past and continuing before it really registered what had happened.
The thing is, while on the drive up, I distinctly remembered having a thought about just how many dead deer I had seen on the shoulders all over I-85 in southern Virginia, and how I really should keep my guard up while driving at night on this trip. But as I said, this was a stretch of road that was long developed, not very close to any real wooded areas where deer might like to reside in, and where I’d never seen deer before in my life. So my guard was definitely not up at this moment in time, and it just figures that would be when my premonition came to fruition, and I plastered the poor animal.
I replayed the moment in my head countless times at this point and the thing is, I’m not mad at the deer or the species as a whole, like I might’ve been in the past for putting me in this situation. Northern Virginia is an endlessly developing area, and it’s a no brainer that the constant sprawl and development in Fairfax county and surrounding areas are displacing the wildlife all over, and next thing I know I’m hitting deer in a place where I’d never seen deer before in my life.
What I am thankful for is the fact that nobody in my car was hurt, and to my knowledge nobody behind me appeared to be hurt, as I was the first car in the line of cars turning onto the road, and it looked like there were plenty of braking going on behind me. My kids were little zombies watching the iPad, so they didn’t notice anything but the sound of impact and the bump of me running it over, and didn’t seem to care because they were too busy watching Little Einsteins. This wasn’t a conversation that I would’ve wanted to have had, so I take it as a win, on all accounts.
Additionally, despite looking pretty nasty when I originally did stop, when I got to my cousin’s place, we were able to pop the initial dent back out, which was a big victory, as it was pushing the wheel liner into contact with the tire, and there was initial talk about cutting it off in order to remain drivable. A little duct tape and a few zip ties, and my car was safe enough to have made the return trip to Georgia, to where its repair is now on the table in coming weeks.
Here’s the thing though-as much as something like this probably would have tanked the entire trip for me in the past, I realized that there were so many other victories to be had given the circumstances, that the main L taken that will cost actual money and likely aggravation of playing car Tetris or a rental didn’t seem so bad. Plus, when I got back to my cousin’s place, dinner was ready, two beers, a fire pit, reminiscing with my cousins while hearing the sound of my kids having a blast with their cousins really rescued the night and I like to think that this was all one of those, you know you’re maturing, kind of scenarios.
Also, waking up to the worst news possible of hearing of a passing of a loved one to my brother’s family really does knock everything else into a genuinely thankful perspective, on Thanksgiving. Pretty much nothing can top that as far as bad news is concerned, but again, trying to find the silver lining in bad situations, given the circumstances of the departed’s final days, there’s probably a modicum of relief in knowing that they’re no longer in any pain or having to fight the good fight any longer.
As sad and heartbroken I felt for my brother’s family, it really did help put everything else into perspective about the things that myself and everyone else could genuinely be thankful for. My kids were safe and unaware of the deer situation, most everyone in my family was in good health. I got to spend some time with my parents with my kids, and I’m glad that my kids have interactions and memories with them, because I can count on one hand how many times I’ve seen a grandfather in my life.
Even the whole car debacle afforded me a bonus good memory, because when I took the car on a shakedown ride to make sure it was safe at highway speeds and cornering, I took the opportunity while I was alone to pop by a close friend’s house to say hi and wish them a happy Thanksgiving.
The drive back was long, and doing Richmond to Atlanta was the longest stretch that my kids had ever had to endure in the car, but equipped with a lot of snacks and an iPad full of downloaded shows, they did great. My only gripe is the feeling of being a glorified Uber driver, since I have to focus on driving, and none of my adult passengers can get their heads off of their phones to actually converse or be remotely the types of passengers to help a ride not feel so long.
But as a whole, I still look back at Thanksgiving positively. My kids had a great time with my family, and I was happy to catch up with everyone who came to dinner, and I can only hope that future family gatherings in the future will be as good as this one was, but hopefully with no more deer incidents.