Sometimes you end up a streak on the pavement.

I'll just say upfront that context of this entry is going to be weird.
but that's me. sorry.

For some reason, the county or the state has cut off funding for the highway department to pick up roadkill until June because of high gas prices. Needless to say, the shoulders are littered with bloated and half-scavenged carcasses of deer, raccoons, possums, and other things splattered beyond recognition.

It's made me realize a few things.
1) The guys that pick up roadkill have an important job. and one that I would not want (except it would be free groceries).
2) Our politicians are not smart.
3) A freaking lot of animals die on our locals highways and byways everyday (I saw no fewer than 4 dead deer just today).

But it's that third point I'll focus on.
Sunday night I narrowly missed a raccoon as it darted across the road between myself and an oncoming SUV.

Yesterday, while cruising the fine streets of Pekin, a Jack Russell terrier bolted across the path of an oncoming truck and I hit the gas to avoid it going under my back tires. It's owner, a young boy on a bike, watched horrified as his best friend was nearly flattened before his eyes. I could see him crying out across the street in my rearview mirror. As traffic cleared the intersection, he pedaled as fast as he could down the adjacent street to catch the frightened pup.

I couldn't help but think of the pain it would have caused the boy if his dog, his friend, would have been lost while just doing what dogs do. Seeking what was across the next street with reckless abandon. What's over that next hill or around the corner? Dogs don't think about the consequences. They don't count the cost of their wandering.
are we so different?

Our own Master calls out to us daily, trying to keep up from becoming a streak on the pavement. The world bowls us over, spins us around, tramples us, and kicks us into the ditch. The world keeps going. People are left to rot while the world drives by, focused on the own road ahead.

But we can keep them from becoming food for the birds and wild animals by walking with them. While we can't take the cars of the road, we can amplify the Master's call. While not choking them with a chain of rules, regulations, and religion, we can take them by the hand and show them a better way to navigate life here.

and one day they will safely reach their destination.