Paperwork

I was waiting to cross LaSalle Street at Madison during this past week's driving snow when the gentleman next to me stepped into the path of a car running a red light.

I grabbed the soft elbow of his tan cashmere overcoat and firmly pulled him back. He whipped his head around to look at me accusingly, then turned to see the cell-phoned woman piloting the errant Camry, clueless to the world, through the snow-covered intersection. He turned his head back to me, his face filled with gratitude and apology. "Oh my God. Thank you."

I looked at him and with a mixture of paternalism and amiability crowed, "Don't worry about it. Do you know how much paperwork I have to fill out if I see some guy killed in an intersection?"

The woman next to him burst into laughter. He looked at me with bewilderment. And I walked off, content in my role as slayer of bureaucracy and thwarter of young women more concerned with cell phones than murder.