The Center of the Universe

The car in front of me won’t move. We are not in a school zone, there is no one in front of us, but they won’t move. They car starts to roll forward, as if they have just taken their foot off the brake, but they don’t hit the gas pedal, they just creep forward. What are they waiting for? I’m stuck in the rush hour as everyone is heading home. Not me, I am on my way to basketball practice, and if I’m late the whole team will have to run. I hate having to rush in traffic but it’s a common occurrence because I don’t plan for traffic or other inconveniences along the way. Traffic is at a stand still and cars have started honking at the immobile car. I hate honking my horn. I know that it is there for safety purposes, in case someone pulls out in front of you and you have to warn them, etc. But even in those instances I’ll probably just try to move out of their way because I really despise honking the horn. The honking grows increasingly louder, but traffic doesn’t move. You would think we lived in Chicago, with all the construction slowing traffic. We are still not moving. This is ridiculous, but we have almost arrived at the two-lane section of the road. I drive around the motionless car very carefully, because the space is tight, and I keep driving. I don’t look over at the driver to see if they are giving me a death glare, I just look forward and drive, because I am way to late to worry about the driver hating me. Other cars follow, but the car is still standing still. Now I realize that there might be a problem. What if someone is injured or sick in the car? What if their car’s engine is malfunctioning? Should I have stopped?

It's already 5:30 pm and Sabina is late for work. She grabs her stuff and heads toward her car, but the sudden movement hurts her stomach and she is forced to stop abruptly. For the past couple days her stomach has been hurting. Sabina hopes that she ate something bad and will soon feel better, but she’s starting to worry.  She gets to the car and realizes she forgot her keys. Hurrying back inside, she finds that her dog has tipped his food bowl over, scattering dog food all over her carpet, but she can’t stop to clean it up. Sabina finally gets into the car and pulls out. Her car is making a funny sound but that will have to wait too. Today Campus is busy, because rush hour just started, and the students just returned from Thanksgiving break. It’s 5:45 and everyone’s going home after the long work day. Sabina makes it to the intersection just a block away from her workplace, when the motor stops. It just shut down. She tries to roll the car forward to let the honking cars behind her pass, but her car is barely inching forward. Cars start to pass her and suddenly she feels an incredibly sharp pain in her abdomen, like knives stabbing from all sides. She can’t move. Finally, a car stops to help her and takes her to the emergency room. The doctor tells her that she has appendicitis, and that her appendix must be removed immediately.

This is an imaginary story, but could possibly happen. The situation with the slow-moving car in front of me really did happen, but I’m pretty sure that he/she was a U of I student who didn’t know how to drive. In class we recently listened to the speech “This is Water”. What really struck me was how he described humans as naturally self-centered. He made a similar example, with a sick child and their parent rushing to get to the hospital. Most people think in one perspective, their own.  It is so easy to think that we are the center of the universe and that we are having the worst day, when it might be more important for us to think from different perspectives. If this story had occurred in reality, would I have stopped to look if the lady in the car was ok? After hearing the speech, I have been trying to look at people from a perspective other than my own and realize that they might be having the worst day of their lives, while I am just late for a basketball practice or stressed about homework.