I thought I was functioning on a pretty even keel.

Until Hooligan sent me this link.

Now the tears are drying on my cheeks again.

Thanks, Hooligan.

Monday's route took me over the bridge again. Got there minutes after sunset.

Parked on the bridge.

And sat on the edge, dropping large grains of sand I picked off the roadway into the dark water below.

One...

Two...

Three...plunk.

Three seconds to fall. Three seconds to hit bottom.

I have done this before, wondering what those three seconds would be like. Were like. How long would they last?

I know, my imagination is running overtime here. I suspect this is not healthy.

Interpolating off the topo map, I estimate the bridge is ~100 feet high. From high school physics I remember that the acceleration due to gravity is 16 feet per second per second. If I remembered my high school calculus, I could calculate the height exactly.

But now I am measuring the height not in feet, but in floors.

Ten floors.

How long would the fall be with another 100 floors added underneath these ten? Calculus wouldn't help. I remember from my brief flirtation with skydiving that the human body in freefall reaches maximum acceleration at about 120 mph. At that point, wind resistance balances gravity. How long a fall?

You do the math.

I read in a news report that at least one man tried to scale down the outside of the tower he was in. And made it three floors before losing it.

The towers had been climbed freehand several times. It was possible.

But those people were in condition. Their fingers were ready for the effort.

But it was at least a chance for life.

He was the wisest man in the buildings. Any chance, no matter how slim, is better than none.

As I sat on the curbing, staring at the wheels of the truck carrying the incredulous heelers, I again, for the second time ever, heard a vehicle coming down the road while on the bridge.

Quickly loaded up and started rolling.

A large sedan, headlights on, passed over the bridge. I watched in the mirror as it pulled into the parking area. The isolated, dark parking area.

As I said, my imagination has been working overtime. I thought about two sisters riding down this road at night. Did they pass other vehicles in the dark? Hope and pray for a miracle, that one would turn around and follow?

Two miles up the road I killed the headlights and turned around.

There is a spot on the road, on my side of the canyon, where you can overlook the parking area. But you're in plain sight, and this isn't a warden's rig. There is no switch to kill the brake lights.

I crawled into that spot, downshifting as I went to slow down without using brakes. But finally I had to touch them, igniting a red flare against the hillside.

The car was sitting in the middle of the parking lot. No one out of the vehicle.

But the headlights were still on, unlikely to be the case if they were trying to hide. And it was facing into the overlook, not out for a quick getaway.

I'm being foolish.

Fifteen seconds after I hit my brakes, the car turns to leave. Possibly a lovers' tryst, high schoolers with beer, who knows? But I have no business here. I also turn and leave.

It was a silly thing to do, and not really worth mentioning here. Not sure why I do.

But I have been telling myself for some time now...

If someone needs help, I want to be the person who turns around. Not the guy who goes on minding his own business.