good citizen or bad luck?

Life has been vaguely out-of-the-ordinary interesting lately. First, thwarting an attempted bike thief. Then, becoming a temporary home for a wayward ferret. 

Now, on Monday night, one month exactly after seeing the bike theft in progress at the end of my run, we were running the same course and I’m almost back at Niketown. Waiting at a red light to cross and a honk followed by SMASH! and I see a car get hit, spun around and thrown up on to the curb. As I’m worried if everyone is all right, mentally piecing together what I just saw and trying to cross the street as drivers are a little unsure of how to proceed, I see the driver of the car that was hit get out and storm towards the hitter (hittee?), looking for all the world like she’s going to deck him. The guy in the car in the next lane from the hit car is stopped with his hazards on, traffic is kind of stopped, it’s pretty chaotic. I assess and decide traffic will have to figure itself out (I frequently find myself directing traffic around accidents for some reason. I like to think it’s all the years of being in charge at events that has me ready to take charge while others are in a daze or going about their business. Maybe I’m just foolhardy or secretly longing to be a cop or traffic flagger. But, I digress)

Go over, driver of hit car is not injured, and is no longer going to punch anyone. Very mild-mannered Prius driver who caused the accident comes over, looking a little unsure of what just happened.  Another witness and those involved keep commenting that the driver in front of the Prius ran a VERY red light, and they’re sure Prius guy was just following the driver in front of him. No one wants poor Prius guy to be at fault, but, he knows he is. Calls are made, I give them my information as a good citizen witness and continue the last four blocks of my run in the rain.

As if that weren’t enough, on my morning run today, we were running late and it was going to have to be short. But, just a few blocks in, there’s a black dog running loose, one block from where Big S found the ferret. The dog wants nothing to do with us, so I keep going, thinking maybe I can be on time this morning. Then, guilt gets the best of me, thinking if it were furry S running loose, I would hope someone would try to return her. So, we turn around. I tie up my snarling beast and take some treats over to this friendly, but timid dog. No collar. Darn. I can’t take it with me with only one leash, so I head for home. Stop at one house where there is a similar dog, usually off leash. Not theirs. Get home, grab a spare leash and some treats, get in the car and try and find it. After 10 minutes of driving the streets, decide it found home again. At least I know I had done what I could.

As I was reviewing all of my acts of being a good citizen of late (trying not to break my elbow patting myself on the back), a thought crossed my mind. Maybe it’s not that I’m a helpful citizen, but rather a bad-luck omen, causing these things to happen. I sure hope not, but if you suddenly start avoiding me, I’ll understand why.