If you ask me, the only wall America needs its new president to build is between my car and anyone who would rear end it. That’s my conclusion after last evening’s unpleasantness. Julie and I spent about six hours in the ER being checked out after the crash. Our doctor ordered us to do it, given our mutual history of back and neck problems, which is much, much more serious with Julie (the discs in her neck are more degenerate than a Nazi art exhibit). We didn’t get home till 1:30 a.m.

I was supposed to be on a flight to New York now, headed up for a presentation tonight at a Tikvah Fund gathering. My doctor said he did not want me traveling. I’m really bummed about missing the Tikvah event, and about a couple of other things I had planned, including meeting Jon Haidt. Oh well. It is not a pleasant thing to be struck from behind by a metal object traveling at 30 miles per hour, even if there is half a car between you to absorb the blow. But it could have been so very much worse, obviously.

Funny, but it was raining all day here yesterday. Lucas and I went to a wake in St. Francisville, and I talked to him all the way up there about the importance of defensive driving. In the town, a careless driver very nearly hit us when he pulled into our lane. I leaned on the horn and we narrowly avoided collision.

“How were you so cool about that?” Lucas asked.

“Defensive driving instinct,” I told him. “It helps if you look out for what the other guy might do. You can’t anticipate everything, but sometimes you can avoid problems.”

“But it would have been his fault if we had crashed.”

“True, but we could have been hurt, and our car still would have been damaged.”

On the way back to Baton Rouge, we saw police clearing a wreck in which a pickup had gone under an 18-wheeler trailer and sheared its top off. And we saw one more almost-wreck. This occasioned more defensive driving talk.

And then later that night, Julie and I got struck from behind by a careless driver (who was very apologetic, I must say).

I’m very sore this morning, so I’m going to take it easy from posting. Julie is still sleeping, but given how fragile her back and neck are on a good day — and yesterday was not a good day — I imagine she’s going to need a lot of help today. To that end, I think I can count on the support of the ER doctors, as well as you readers, when I say that now is the time for me to implement my plan to hire a Brazilian au pair. Yes?

UPDATE: Sorry to have misled you readers — I’m totally joking about the Brazilian au pair. I can just hear me saying to my sweet rose of Texas, “Honey, I’m thinking it might be a good idea to take the burden off of you by hiring a Brazilian au pair, don’t you?” The scene that would follow that would be like something off The Itchy & Scratchy Show, with me as Scratchy, or what’s left of him. Now, if I offered to bring in a Russian babushka…