I almost hit someone with my car the other day.

It wasn’t on purpose or anything, but it also wasn’t the first time this sort of thing has ever happened to me. And, I admit, this was probably the closest I’ve ever come to maiming someone with my vehicle.

I was idling at a stop sign, checking to my left on a relatively busy Capitol Hill street, scouting my opening for a right turn. I found my spot and hit the gas, realizing my error just in time to catch the break before a mid-20-something had to throw his hand onto my car and twist his feet up like a kick-flipping skateboarder.

Now, I’ve heard my bicyclist friends talk about getting swiped by cars and how they’ve always come out with, at most, a scratch. It’s almost always fine.

But this was a pedestrian. And I practically knocked him onto my hood.

The man looked at me behind his dark-rimmed glasses, shocked, through the windshield. But he never really stopped walking. His glaring eyes were pretty clearly asking, “What the hell is wrong with you?” I responded with the unhelpful and inaudible, behind closed window hand motions that you might expect to see Jerry do on “Seinfeld,” along with the most legitimately sorry and apologetic face I have.

The apparently uninjured man kept distancing himself, and made a wavering hand motion — kind of like if someone was making the “50/50” signal. I wasn’t really sure what that meant: He was 50/50 on the verge of running at me and clubbing me with his fists, he was 50/50 on whether or not to sue my negligent keister for the neck injury he was going to fake or, maybe, that he was 50/50 unsure if he wanted to become my best friend because he was so impressed by how responsibly I was handling the situation. He seemed pretty angry, so I’m guessing it wasn’t that last one. But you never know — I’m a pretty convincing mime.

This whole interaction is the unfortunate side effect of driving 45 minutes to and from work every day. And, although my mom will hate to hear this, the possibility of stupid drivers (e.g. me) getting myself or someone else hurt has exponentially increased. I’ve been fortunate enough in the past to be in walking, or near walking, distance from most every one of my other jobs. This is my first lengthy commute.

But beyond the mileage, this is just another reminder of how quickly your normal day can turn into the most important (good or bad) of your life. In this case, that guy probably told his friends about the idiot who nearly broke his legs. I, in turn, told my friends about how I was the idiot that nearly broke some guy’s legs. We all move on.

Unfortunately, that’s not always the case. People die. People’s femurs break. People get sued. People rarely end up as new best friends.

I don’t mean to be a “look on the bright side” kind of fool, but the nearly catastrophic sometimes does help put life in perspective. At least for the moment.

About 20 minutes later in my drive to work that day, I watched as a semi truck partially ran a red light and nearly flatten a man in a white Pontiac Sunfire who was desperately laying on his horn. The day could have been much worse.

Sorry again, mom.