Memory place
In a curve on the country road to our house is one of those places where someone must have had a car crash. Fresh flowers, changed often, mark the spot.
I bike past that spot everyday on my way to and from the busstop, and every single time I pay attention to that spot and wonder what happened there, and when.
I decided to write a note to leave there. Something short to let the flower-leaving-people know that someone was thinking of them. I'd put it into a plastic paper protector and attach it to the flowers.
As I cycled past today I noticed that someone had already left some kind of note tucked up in the flowers, a note encased in plastic. I pulled my bike over and read what was there.
It was a very sad and somewhat angry note from the parents of a young man who had been driving on our road two years ago. He swerved to miss a motorcycle that was coming too fast in the wrong lane. The parents lost their beloved son, Andreas, and the motorcyclist had no accident and thus survived. The parents were angry that their son, who had done nothing wrong, had died in that place while the motorcyclist who was compltetely in the wrong, lived.
I took the time to write a note to them, hunkered down there beside my bicycle and their memorial flowers. I hope that they are comforted a little bit by it and not offended that a stranger invaded their space. It is impossible for me to say what I would do in their place, but something in me hopes that they will be able to move on and leave flowers in places where Andreas lived.
I bike past that spot everyday on my way to and from the busstop, and every single time I pay attention to that spot and wonder what happened there, and when.
I decided to write a note to leave there. Something short to let the flower-leaving-people know that someone was thinking of them. I'd put it into a plastic paper protector and attach it to the flowers.
As I cycled past today I noticed that someone had already left some kind of note tucked up in the flowers, a note encased in plastic. I pulled my bike over and read what was there.
It was a very sad and somewhat angry note from the parents of a young man who had been driving on our road two years ago. He swerved to miss a motorcycle that was coming too fast in the wrong lane. The parents lost their beloved son, Andreas, and the motorcyclist had no accident and thus survived. The parents were angry that their son, who had done nothing wrong, had died in that place while the motorcyclist who was compltetely in the wrong, lived.
I took the time to write a note to them, hunkered down there beside my bicycle and their memorial flowers. I hope that they are comforted a little bit by it and not offended that a stranger invaded their space. It is impossible for me to say what I would do in their place, but something in me hopes that they will be able to move on and leave flowers in places where Andreas lived.