After Monday morning, I now divide my life into two parts:
*B.I.K.F.D.
and
**A.I.K.F.D.
It's terrible.
So, it was a Monday morning and I was driving between 45 and 50 mph down a semi-busy four lane road with my 4-year-old in the backseat. If you were stopped at this light, you would turn left and be close to where it all went down:
At the part of the road where "it all went down", there are two lanes traveling in one direction, a median, and two lanes traveling in the opposite direction. I was in the inside lane when all of a sudden, the car to my right slams on his brakes, which prompts me to...
Okay, I didn't slam on my brakes fast enough...
AND I HIT FIVE DUCKS.
Here's what I saw about a millisecond before that awful moment in time, except there were two adult ducks and about twice as many ducklings:
 |
| Source |
Looking at that picture makes my heart break in TONS of pieces, y'all!!! Someone give me a Kleenex and I'm not kidding!
In very rapid pace, I saw a large duck flying toward my car at which point, I did this,
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!"
and he did this,
"AHHHHHHHHHQUAACKAHHHHHHHHHHHHQUACKAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!"
He flew UNDER my car. The impact of duck to SUV felt much like someone throwing a football at my front fender.
I quickly pull over into the median and I see the mother duck, I'm assuming, rushing over the median and into the other two lanes of traffic with her ducklings probably saying "Ohcrapohquackohcrapohquack". Meanwhile, the dad, the one who had just seen my oil pan, is kind of staggering around and looks much like a duck who has had too much to drink. (And, I'm sure we've all seen plenty of drunk ducks.)
(I'm not trying to make light of this because I don't think it is tragic. It helps me to cope.)
He finally straightens out his feathers, catches up with his family and they all disappear into the woods.
Yay!! He survived!!!
At that point, I only thought I had hit Dad Duck and that he survived, but I decided to go back to the scene of the crime immediately to double-check.
You know what I saw, right?
Four dead ducklings. Complete goners.
I wasn't sure what to do. They were tiny. I couldn't see myself scraping them up and burying them. What was I going to do that with anyway? Poor precious things. Poooooooooor, poor precious things.
"OH, NO!!! I killed those baby ducks!", I said to my 4-year-old while I clutched my face in my hands and stared at staggering Dad Duck.
"You killed baby ducks, Mom?"
"I didn't mean to kill them. They just walked out in the road out of nowhere! I don't even see water ANYWHERE around here. Where were they going?"
"Are they going to be dead forever, Mom?"
Those ducklings had probably just learned to walk. They had probably talked about their vacation to the other side of the four-lane busy street for weeks and then, KERSPLAT, I came along.
So terrible.
So, feeling like a worthless human being, I finally arrive home all sad and mopey still answering my son's question about the ducks being dead forever ("and ever?") because he asked it over and over ("and ever and ever?") and saw this when I got out of the car:
DUCK GUTS!!!
"Ahhhhhhhhh!!!!!!", I immediately yelled. Again. "IS THAT FROM THE DUCKS????"
It took me a few seconds to put it together that that actually wasn't duck guts and was actually the strawberry smoothie my 4-year-old decided to dump out of the window while the car was in motion. ("I didn't want it anymore.") My heart took a few seconds to get the message.
It wasn't long afterwards that I took the car to get it washed. I'm still fearful that I will look down at my tire and see a tiny, tiny duckling feather.
And, since then, my life hasn't been the same.
I keep feeling the bump on the car from Dad Duck plummeting into it. I keep seeing the dead ducklings in my head. I keep remembering how the mother just kept scurrying across the busy street with her other ducklings. I wondered how long she thought about those four. Did she get safely across the street and then stare at them for a while to see if they would move? Was she sad? Or did she just keep running to their vacation spot? Did Dad Duck have an awful headache? Did he have access to Neosporin?
I can't even take a bike ride with my two boys without feeling like a very large duck trying to keep her two ducklings from getting hit by a car. It probably doesn't help that my favorite bike-riding outfit is a Donald Duck costume.
I just was awful on our bike ride today. I possibly overreacted a time or two.
 |
| My ducks. |
"DID YOU SEE THAT CAR? IT WAS TWO MILES AWAY AND PARKED ON THE ROAD! IT COULD HAVE HIT YOU!"
My son can't stop thinking about it either.
"Mom, is those ducks still dead?"
"Mom, I saw a rabbit when I went bike riding with Daddy and no one had hit it yet. No one killed it with their car."
Earlier today I said, "I still can't believe I hit those ducks" as we drove away from dropping my oldest off at school. My 4-year-old then said, "You hit some more?"
(That last question actually made me laugh out loud.)
Like any normal American, I turned to Facebook for some support earlier today. I asked if anyone else had hit an animal before. Here is the tally from the nine people who said they had also hit an animal with their car. As you can see from the list, some people have hit more than one animal in their lifetime. Make that more than two. Or three. No, four.
DEER: 2
SQUIRREL: 3
RABBIT: 1
DOG: 2
BABY ALLIGATOR: 1
BIRD: 1
CAT: 1
BUZZARD: 1
TURTLE: 1
Squirrels need to watch it.
My Facebook friends and family have been lots of help. My cousin's husband, Chris, sent me a Duck a l'Orange recipe. My cousin, Josh, answered the question, "How did you hit four ducks AT ONCE, Kelley?" questions with this answer: "She hit the first one, the second one looked back and said NOOOOO, splat...then the 3rd one looked back and said NOOOOOO, splat and so on." (He's a hunter. He's got tough skin when it comes to taking out ducks.)
Another friend, Tara, called me a birderer. A BIRDERER!!!!!!
*Grabs more tissues*
You have never hit anything before, have you? *Blows nose loudly* You have never extinguished the life (or lives) of precious, innocent animals with your mean, mean, mean, mean vehicle before, have you?
Or have you?
HAVE YOU EVER HIT AN
ANIMAL WHILE DRIVING?
ANIMAL WHILE DRIVING?
In case you were still racking your brain over this one:*B.I.K.F.D. = Before I killed four ducklings**A.I.K.F.D. = After I...yeah, you got it.
____________________________________
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38 comments:
I ran over a squirrel once and felt terrible about it. I was actually quite surprised by the guilt. Up until that point I had never really thought twice about dead squirrels or opossums on the side of the rode. But once you feel that shock of seeing them in front of your car followed by the sound of the car hitting and running over them, it's a whole new story.
I know this must be tragic for you but I can't stop laughing at the line where your son said "You hit some more?"
I was the front seat passenger when my friend hit a very large opossum standing in the middle of the road at night. I was a horrible passenger because I screamed hysterically.
I'm sorry this happened to you. I think the way to even out your karma is to avoid any duck related menu items at restaurants for a while. (At least 5 times, I think.)
I hit a deer while driving home from college for winter break. I can still see his face flying toward the windshield.
The worst part is this was before cell phones, so I had to walk to find a payphone to call for help. And that I killed a deer.
I hit a deer driving home on a duskie night. it ran across 2 lanes of pretty heavy traffic jumped a median then BOOM. I hit him he did this really cool flip thing over my Hood then ran into the corn fields. It totalled my Nissan altima. The deer killed my car! Not sure if I killed him or not. Then i got a ticket and the police officer almost took me to jail because of some silly ticket I forgot to pay. That deer sure did get back at me!!!
I hit a bird once. I thought that maybe it got away just fine because when I looked back he wasn't anywhere to be seen. But when I pulled up to school, I came around the front of my car and there he was: face-planted into my grill. Wings stretched, feet curled, and face gone. I cried.
We live around a TON of ducks and so far I haven't hit any. It's only a matter of time though because these particular animals really do hog the road around here. I am so very sorry for your experience :( I couldn't help but laugh out loud at the Duck Guts. So glad there was another explanation--it looked like a crime scene!
Oh my gosh, im sorry but I cried the entire time reading that post. But not the appropriate kind of tears. Seriously had to keep wiping my eyes and stop laughing to continue. You hit my funny bone. I swear I am a normal compassionate human being, if I had hit those baby ducks I would have been a blubbering mess!
Once I ran over a nest of baby rabbits with the lawn mower. It was awful! They were so, so tint. Probably only a few days old. I massacred one of them, the others were alive, but the mom wouldn't come back to the nest and the babies were terrified of me (for obvious reasons). My sister took them home and tried to nurse them with baby formula through an eye dropper, but they all died. It was one of the saddest weeks of my life. On the plus side, that was 10 years ago and my husband still doesn't ask me to mow the lawn.
A baby deer ran into the side of my car once when my three year old was in the backseat. It was on a dangerous, curvy stretch of road where I couldn't stop. I told my son that the deer ran home to its mommy, and then I called the police when I got home. I felt horrible! But what kind of irresponsible deer mama lets her baby run into traffic like that?!
I've hit a bird that SMASHED into my windshield whe I was doing 45MPH. It exploded, I kid you not. I've also run over a turtle, bunny, large black snake, squirrel and a wild turkey.
The thought of the inside of a bird on my winshield still makes me twitch. :(
I am proud to say I have never hit or killed another living creature. Although as soon as I pull out of my driveway today I am sure I'll run an animal over. That was a sad story, but I loved the part about the ducks planning their vacation across the street for weeks and the Dad duck staggering around like he had too much to drink. I have to say though the photo of the car (Pulp Fiction-style) was completely unnecessary.
Oh you poor thing... I can so relate. I ran over a chipmunk and my kids were convinced that I killed Alvin.
My husband hit a deer with me in the car. In his defense, it jumped out of the woods ONTO the front hood of the car, then hit the windshield. There was literally no response that could've changed that hit. And the freaking deer ran off and left us with thousands of dollars' worth of car damage. FYI, deer don't have auto insurance, or if they do, they prefer not to share it so their rates won't go up.
My all-time-most-cringeworthy story involving animals and cars involves my birthdad. My family was on vacation in Texas, and we stopped at this place near a beach that had outdoor dining. Extremely casual. Picnic tables for eating, and the workers brought the burgers, tater tots, etc. out to you. Well, we had a ridiculous amount of tater tots left after we were full, so we start tossing them to the seagulls that were all begging in the parking lot. My birthdad decided to throw one way up into the air, as hard as he could. Unfortunately, it went out over the road, and two gulls saw it. They both simultaneously dove for it, and right as they neared the ground they crashed head-first into each other. And were immediately struck and killed by an oncoming car. Recapping it now, I laugh at the ridiculousness. But at the time it was traumatizing.
Ah! So sad, I know your paint - but that didn't keep me from laughing my head off at your post - especially "you hit some MORE?"
I ran over a deer once which was already dead I hope, and the sound of all the bones rattling under my car for MILES after still haunts me.
those "guts" smoothie pics would have put me over the edge! I ran over a DOG (long story, wasn't my fault) and felt HORRIBLE but the worst was the owner who was FOAMING at the mouth....no joke. I felt like I needed to lock my doors as I rolled down the window just a little so he wouldn't kill me.....I didn't know what to do....awful story. ):
I grew up in a very rural area. I've hit a cat, bunnies, squirrels, birds - they just run right in front of you - or under your car or fly into your windshield. It always RUINS me for a while, because I feel so awful. So sad. Hugs
I grew up in a very rural area. I've hit a cat, bunnies, squirrels, birds - they just run right in front of you - or under your car or fly into your windshield. It always RUINS me for a while, because I feel so awful. So sad. Hugs
When my husband once hit a squirrel, I wept. I kid you not. And I was shaking like a PTSD survivor.
A bunny. I was 17. I'll never forget it. My boyfriend made fun of me when I called him sobbing.
That's horrible, but it happens to all of us. Someone really ought to teach these animals to look both ways before crossing the street. I hit a deer once. Well, actually, the deer hit me. Just ran across the street and plowed head first into the side of my car. I didn't know what to do!
I showed up at a picnic once with a pretty yellow goldfinch stuck in the front bumper of my minivan. Don't even know how that happened.
And then there was the time I was driving along on the first day of spring, really enjoying the beautiful sunny weather and saw a butterfly flitting along in front of the car. "Oh, look a butter... SPLAT!" Sad...
Maybe I can get my sister to tell her raccoon story. It may be the most horrible, awful story in the whole world, but funny too. :)
Forgot to mention, don't feel too bad about it. It's all the ducks fault anyway. When are they going to abide by the rules of the road? Did they even wait for the walk sign?
I see my jokes aren't funny enough. Get me a tissue I'm going to cry like you do. Lol, very funny read.
I'm so sorry that this was HILARIOUS...and sad. I remember driving with a friend of mine (in high school) who hit a rabbit. He was driving us to a friend's house where I ended up being the only girl--and the only one who had a problem with it. A decade later I was driving alone and a squirrel decided to turn around after he had safely reached the other side of the road and tried to commit suicide by leaping in front of my car. The scary thing is I didn't feel a thud and there was no body. I was convinced that he had grabbed onto whatever one could grab onto under the car and was going to crawl up to the windshield to go all Cujo-squirrel on me. So glad THAT didn't happen!
I've never run over an animal before, but I was in the backseat of a car that hit a deer one time! It was seriously scary business!
I saw a squirrel get run over once and my heart was broken as I watched it squirm around on the road before it died :(
I feel your pain Kelley.
I hit a deer with my van this summer. Well actually, she hit me and then stumbled off into the woods.
I also accidentally ran over a rabbit a couple of winters ago. It was extremely gruesome and I had to put him out of his misery with a snow shovel. It was horrible. I had to drive another hour with that on my conscience before I got home.
Also, once I was puttering around town on my moped and a bird flew into my face. I don't know what kind of bird it was, but it got up and flew away shortly after (albeit a little drunkenly).
I hit a kitten. A little kitten. So, make room in adorable animal jell for me too.
Omg, so funny yet so tragic.....the smoothie really put things over the edge...lol
I'm sorry Kel, but this is so funny, I'm clutching my stomach laughing, and quite literally trying to refrain from dropping to the ground and rolling around in hysterics. I know you're sad you hit those ducks. It is sad. But on a positive note...oh, who 'my kidding, I can't think of a positive note. You're funny. If you want to write a tragic post, you need to stay away from sharing about the "duck a l'orange recipe" and the "birderer" comment. What I would give to hit a few ducks right now and have a funny tale to tell. I'm all "getting in touch with my feelings" lately....sigh...don't come by. Ain't no dead ducks over at my place.
I'm speechless. Wow. Poor lil duckies... You made me cringe when I saw that stuff on your car. GUH-ROSS!
I'm not sure anyone but you could turn something so awful (I know it was awful for you. I do. I just KNOW) into a story that funny.
And sad. Tragic, even.
But dude.
Still funny.
My mom once hit a bird that was roughly the size of our car...
@stephaniegieseHey! I am a giese too! :)
@Christian at Point Counter-Point Point Point As soon as he said that, I laughed. He told me, "Don't tell anyone I told you that, Mom." Aren't I awful for putting it in the blog post??
Oh no! I'm pretty sure I'd be traumatized too!
Oh, that's so sad! I'm horror struck and I wasn't there.
I have no hit anything yet (finding wood to knock on right now... I know I've just jinxed myself and I will probably take out a bunny family on my way home). But I am a sucker for animals and I'm that girl who always tried to save everything injured. Birds. Mice. Squirrels. Rabbits. And when they would die, my heart would break.
I'm so sorry. But I really did appreciate the way you shared your sad story. I do hope the daddy duck was ok and the mommy duck wasn't too despondent.
Darn it. Now I'm going to be thinking about that mama duck all day.
Stopping by from SITS.
One time we hit a rabbit or something small and furry during a late night drive. We convinced everyone we narrowly escaped a run-on with a deer.
We've also ran over a boar while on the way to the airport in Germany, I mean seriously, are those even real? It messed us up and we ended up missing our flight from Germany to England and then back to the states. And we had to spend that night in the airport. misery
My dad unavoidably ran over a dachshund on the way to church once. I'm 50+ years old now & the thud-thud of the tires going over that dog is something I won't ever forget.
However that experience did not keep me from finding the humor in seeing a squashed dead squirrel on the way to work. This squirrel was smashed flatter than a pancake except for his tail. His little bushy tail was just a-fluttering in the breeze! I felt bad for Mr. Squirrel but I liked it that his tail could still dance.
I came upon your post as I was googling "Can a deer survive getting hit by my car if I managed to stop before it hit my car and then it ran off into the woods?" Yes, not much popped up on that long search. I shortened it and your post on ducks came up. Thank you for the laugh. I needed it. I have felt so guilty for hitting the beautiful buck that ran into dh's BRAND NEW car yesterday. Especially since I think it was "our" buck. Yes, the buck that often frequents our yard with his wife and two babies. Ugh. I am hoping I see him prancing up my driveway soon so I won't be considered a deerurder. Anyway, guilt loves association so thanks again for sharing in a manner that let me laugh. You have a very entertaining blog.
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