Theme of Death, Part 2

About 24 hours after I lamented the four losses, due to the four deaths tangential to my own personal sphere last week, Mother Nature added one more classmate to the list, within just a few days of the other classmate dying. He was 11 days older than me. I had known him since first or second grade, and maybe before that. I believe the one and only time we had a whole conversation was in the third grade. The last time I saw him was several years ago, at a bar, and he was wearing plastic glasses that were lit up with lights, and maybe a message saying, "Merry Christmas," or "Happy New Year," or something like that. I said hi --- he was standing right in front of me --- and either he didn't see or hear me or he just didn't feel like acknowledging my existence. At the time I believed the latter. He may have given me a quick, insincere nod; I can't be sure. But I am from a small town, and sometimes it feels like the people who grew up there with me are in a big extended family. Our grandmothers were good friends. In the third grade, I spent an afternoon with him at the senior center, painting ceramics in the art department with him. Hence our only existing conversation. Every so often, I would hear bits and pieces about his life from my grandmother, but she didn't gossip, so I didn't hear that much. She would just hint. He has a My Space page. I wonder what will happen to it.
While we are young, life seems to be a permanent situation, but all the sudden, without warning, the light goes out, and we are all left to be reminded by the randomness of tragedy and that life can be violently transitory. What is the point of the word permanent? There is no such thing. Permanent record. Permanent marker. Permanent doesn't mean what it purports to mean.
I went by a car accident today on the interstate near Sutton. I meant to leave Charleston earlier, but I didn't. I wonder how much closer I would have been to becoming part of the accident if I had left when I had meant to leave. I passed by the wreckage before the rescue and police vehicles arrived. About eight cars were stopped, lots of people were on their cell phones, people were on the grass, and a little yellow car was upside down, with its roof totally crushed. There was no room left in there for survivors, I am sure of it. I saw an ambulance and police car going to the accident about five minutes later, driving in the direction of the crash. Right before I went by the crash, a man in a pink shirt and tie sped by in a BMW and smiled at me while he was driving at about 85 miles an hour. It was a funny moment, because we both looked at each other at exactly the same time and had the same expression on our faces. Curiosity first, not expecting that the other would be looking, and then amusement. And then the accident. He slowed down for a few miles, but then resumed the high-tailing up north. Life goes on.