YOU KNOW what they all say about this odd curiosity of a thing called Murphy’s Law. If anything can go wrong, it definitely will.
A few years ago, while navigating an intersection one early morning at the city’s already-clogged Diversion Road, my son failed to beat the yellow light and was promptly waved by a traffic cop to pull over by the roadside.
As the youngling was being given a written reprimand, all under the generic heading of careless driving, I could sense that the hint of a smile on the copper’s face reflected my son’s near panic and uneasiness at receiving his first-ever traffic violation, and oddly for “speeding” at that.
Luckily for him, though, the officer, after assessing the circumstances, ruled it as a minor offense. We have only to pay a small fine. But this, he cautioned, we would have to settle at the barangay center at the soonest time. Being so, the mister cop explained, it wouldn’t reflect on his record at the transportation office if we did so before the day ended.
Interestingly enough, the words of his kindergarten and first mentor, the late Teacher Detty, played vividly in my mind. “Ang nagmamadali, nagkakamali (One who hurries, makes mistakes.)”
No matter, my son’s reason for trying to beat the light had revolved around arriving early for a test at the transportation licensing office, which only allowed the first 60 people to enter.
I had recalled saying before we left the house, adhering to traffic rules and not being distracted from the task at hand was way more important than hurrying for any exam.
And sure enough, when you least expect that nothing could go wrong because you have prepared enough, Murphy’s entry is magnificently up in stage lights. All else aside, however, I thought later that things might’ve turned out differently and someone might have gotten hurt, so all good na lang.
Up till now, I still always have to ask: what’s up with this, our predisposition to committing errors? As an example, why is it that whenever climbing up certain heights, I always hear words of caution like, Don’t look down? And one looks. Or watch out for the corners… and you slam into a post.
A friend shares a view. It’s all a matter of perspective, daw. Skiers, whenever they navigate through a clump of trees, don’t set their minds on avoiding them. Instead, they instruct themselves to focus only on the trail, nothing else. Leave everything at that and “Trust the princess,” ha-ha. It could also be safe to recall Mad Magazine’s mascot, Alfred Neumann when he says it as a-matter-of-factly, What me worry?
If still, all else fails and Murphy rears its ugly head again, consider “grin and bear it,” as plan B.
