My Greatest Fear #18: The Sky Is Falling

This accompanies the story about the hawk in the comments section.

When I bought my Camry four years ago, I was delighted to find that it had a moonroof. “Perfect,” I thought. “Now I can drive through the country on summer nights with friends, admiring the star-filled sky through my moonroof.” That’s the dream, right?

However, very rarely have I actually used the moonroof, much less even opened the protective cover on the ceiling of my car. Why?

I’m afraid that something will fall through the moonroof onto my head.

This has to happen every now and then, right? Maybe something falls off a truck or a rock falls off an overpass. Things fall all the time.

A quick search on Google for “fell through moonroof” reveals thousands of hits, including some guy in California who wants a moonroof added to his car and an anonymous posting on a discussion board about a deal for a car with a moonroof falling through. So obviously this is a common fear.

Also, related, I roll down all the windows of my car except for my driver’s side window, lest something fly through the window and under my sunglasses to blind me. It could happen.

16 thoughts on “My Greatest Fear #18: The Sky Is Falling”

    • HA Jamey in this helmet !!! Maybe he has been jealous of his brother all along. His brother had to wear a helmet full time (except when sleeping) when he was one years old. He wore the helmet for about a year. Maybe Jamey would not have this fear if he too wore a helmet when he was little.

      Reply
  1. I think you should start traveling in a Zorb. That way you can have a safe travel from point A to point B, things coming your way would bounce off you, and you would have your daily recommended exercise. Or you can wear that shiny helmet then you can have all the windows open and have no worries about getting blind by unexpected stuff or getting hit in the head by a flying turtle.

    Reply
  2. I’m not kidding or exaggerating in the following story:

    Two years ago, my boyfriend and I were cruising with the windows down on a particularly nice September afternoon. I’m driving, boyfriend is riding shotgun. I’m traveling roughly 60 mph. Suddenly, I see a large bird of prey swooping down and I think, “Oh dear Lord, I’m going to hit this bird and it’s going to break my windshield.” As I’m done with that sentence in my head, I hear a large *BOOM* and I yell an religious-themed obscenity. Wondering why my boyfriend is not yelling b/c surely that thing hit the windshield directly in front of him, I turn to look at him. He’s curled up in the passenger seat, cradling his head and yelling “WTF was that? I think the visor just hit me in the head!” I realized what had happened and laughed so hard my stomach cramped and I couldn’t breathe.

    A hawk had flown through the passenger window and hit my boyfriend in the face.

    He didn’t believe me when I first told him a bird of prey had hit him in the face. Then I pointed to the feathers strewn across my dash and floor. Further proof was discovered when boyfriend turned around and saw the dead bird in my back seat, slumped against the arm rest on the door. Had the window been down, he may have come through the front passenger seat and out of the driver’s side back window, though I still he would have died upon impact with Boyfriend’s head. Thankfully, that didn’t happen because if it had, we wouldn’t have had the proof in a plastic bag when we got back home. That also allowed us to look up the exact bird that had died against Boyfriend’s face: a Rough-Legged Hawk.

    Boyfriend found feathers in his hat later that evening and when the left side of his face hurt, we surmised that the bird’s wing had probably wrapped around his head upon impact. I still can’t tell that story without laughing because it is by far, the funniest thing I have ever seen in my entire life.

    Reply
    • That. Is. Amazing.

      While reading it, I was thinking the same thing your boyfriend was: “That’s not possible.” But then you said that the bird was in the back seat–that’s proof it happened! Wow. Do you have photos? I’m amazed your boyfriend wasn’t badly hurt. It must have been the wing that hit him, not the beak.

      I’m also guessing that the “religious-themed obscenity” was “sweet baby Jesus.”

      Reply

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