Traveling to work on the train as usual. Back to working again after my holidays.
“…oh, …good”
I would like to chat about my holidays, but an image of a girl being hit by a van keeps plaguing my mind.
I was returning from shopping yesterday with the pushchair. Louise & the kids had taken the bus as it was raining & we had not expected this, so were unprepared. I was just turning up a back cut to the hill up to our house when there was the sort of sound you hope to never hear behind me; the screech of brakes & a thud. Span round to see a girl being knocked over by a van. A flat fronted open backed mini-truck type thing. She was about 7 or 8. The van knocked her down then kept going by momentum. Fortunately the wheels did not touch her. I surmise she was following her mum across the road as she was headed toward me at the time. Again I surmise that the mother may have been getting a younger (4 or 5) boy who was on my side of the road. I spotted him dithering a little later & took him back across the road to his other bothers & sisters while the mother crouched protectively over the girl who was screaming for her. The mother was reassuring her daughter & trying to get the emergency services to her at the same time.
I dwell on this a lot.
I left as I saw what I think was the dr’s/paramedic’s emergency car arriving. Now I wonder if it was a police car, & feel guilt at assuring the mother that there was something arriving. I thought I had a clear picture of what was happening, but I’m not really that sure now.
I think, as the van could not have been going too fast (things would could have been a lot worse) that she will be OK, in that she will survive with bruises, scrapes & possibly broken bones. It was something I never want to see again. It’s something that I would rather not think about, but I keep seeing it.
I will try to write bout my holidays. I thought that writing the above may help set my mind at rest, but it seems to make no difference.
It’s funny, I kind of remain emotionally detached from it all, but it’s never far from my thoughts. Sometimes think of each of the people involved & wonder how they are coping.
Oh well – so much for writing bout the holidays. Manchester is here again, I must to work (work might ‘help’).