My father always refused to wear his seatbelt in the car for some weird reason, like such an extra safety precaution was unnecessarily imposing certain limitations on his way of living. That was his right, coasting around town in that gigantic Cadillac. He felt proud to uphold this strange image, no matter how illogical it may have seemed at the time.

No way that anyone is going to make me wear some boring seatbelt when I have better things to do in life. Don't touch the radio! Leave the air-conditioning alone! Everything is perfectly set and predictable, defining precisely how things will happen.

I mean really, why should one restrain oneself with such a useless strapping item, as if that makes sense and it does not?

The truth is: one accident, perhaps a head-on collision, and things would have been different now. But that never happened, nor could it have happened, so who is right in the end? Things could have easily been otherwise, but I am here nonetheless. At least I had the courage to defy my father and insist on wearing my seatbelt, so more than likely I would have survived anyway.

In that small way I was pretty independent, insisting that the seatbelt was safely in place, so that I would not be hurdled through the front windshield, re-enacting those awful scenes filmed especially for us as a warning during drivers ed. to be careful.

Sorry, but I was just a kid at the time, trying to assert myself in some unrealistic logical manner.