I Brake for Geese

Two Mondays ago, my son started his Driver's Education classes. It's all online with Zoom meetings for 3 hours each day Monday through Friday. The topics covered seem to be fairly standard, what you would expect for classroom activities related to the topic but, apparently, there was a special focus on the "Modern Roundabout".

For those of you who may be wondering, A "modern roundabout" is a type of looping junction in which road traffic travels in one direction around a central island and priority is given to the circulating flow. Signs usually direct traffic entering the circle to slow and to give way to traffic already on it. In theory, this type of intersection allows for greater safety than a regular intersection and less traffic back-up than those controlled by stoplights. I am told that the instructor went on and on about this marvel of engineering.

And said we have one in town.

Let me assure you, we do not.

The closest Modern Roundabout is 19 miles more-or-less south of here at the Iron Man Memorial (no, not that Iron Man) in Chisholm.

So, my wife, my sons and daughter, and I all loaded up in the Jeep and went on a little field trip. We drove several laps through the Modern Roundabout and, armed with the knowledge provided in my son's Driver's Education class, gained a new appreciation for this unsung Traffic Control Hero.

But that is not what I came here to write about today. After our excursion, we decided to take a detour through downtown Chisholm before returning home. Downtown Chisholm is only a few blocks long and within less than a minute, we were on our way.

As headed back out to the main highway, we spied two things. The first was a large-ish flock of geese on both the left and right-hand shoulders of the road. The other was a side-by-side being driven by what I might uncharitably call a pair of rednecks. They were closing in on the road, driving a route that looked to be perpendicular to our own, and seemed to be accelerating to cross the road ahead of us so I was paying pretty close attention to them. What I was not paying attention to was the left-hand flock of geese that were spooked into stampeding onto the road by the approaching side-by-side.

As fowl flooded into the street, I turned my focus back to the myriad feathered obstacles that were now presenting themselves for the slaughter. I was forced to hit the brakes pretty hard to keep from running down the long-necked honkers, which I am half-certain left behind a blackened trail of rubber on the asphalt. Collective gasps and shouted expletives filled the vehicle cabin as we screeched to a halt, allowing the two flocks to merge into one as we narrowly avoided a disastrous collision.