"An Open Letter to the Large Orange SUV that nearly ran me over on my bicycle this morning."

Dear bald man with bad sunglasses driving down Broadway at approximately 9:15 am this morning,

You were stopped at the intersection; you looked up. Was it my imagination, or did we make eye contact? I could have SWORN you looked me in the eye.

I proceeded cautiously. It was my right of way, after all. But you drive a big orange car, and I tend to be mistrusting of big Orange cars. Especially this particular metallic "burn sienna" brand of Orange.

You look down. Maybe at your cell phone, maybe the stereo, maybe your shoes? You look up again, but this time you are not looking at me. You are looking to make a right hand turn. You forget about my existence.

You proceed to make your right hand turn; and you do not take this turn slowly. Quite the contrary- you step on the gas!

Lucky for you, Mr. Bald SUV-driving man, I have the reflexes of a cat.

I swerve left, ramming by bicycle into the curb. I nearly eat it and narrowly avoid a telephone pole. At the last moment I recover and remain upright. I am wobbly, I am scared.

You drive off (in a huff). You do not stop to see if I am ok. You leave me to to contemplate life and death and the dangers of riding a bicycle. I think about these things for then next two blocks as I peddle ever-so-slowly to work.

And even though you don't care...let me tell YOU, sir -- I AM OK (No thanks to you!). My bike is unscratched, I'm only slightly paranoid of any/all bike riding and things that are orange, and I have one large blackish purple bruise on my thigh. Its very ugly, but I like to think of it as a souvenir.

So, if I do, in fact, have the courage to ride my bike down Broadway at 9:15 tomorrow morning -- I certainly hope I do not see your ugly orange monster barreling in my direction.

Because if I do see you tomorrow, I will fight you.

Or at least take down your license plate number and make a few phone calls to the proper authorities.