Crosswalks and self-obsessed drivers

I live in a city that has various nicknames: the city of the future, the city of children, the green city. The vast majority of the families in our fair city have young children - children who go to school, children who walk home from school, children who go to friends houses to play, children who walk to after school activities, etc. In short, there are, at any given hour after sunrise and before sunset, children who need to use crosswalks to get to wherever they are headed. And all of these children have parents who live in this city. Or in reverse, nearly all of the adults driving around the city have young children.

So why is it that seemingly none of these parents has the ability to slow down or *gasp* god forbid STOP to let a child cross the street at a designated crosswalk?! It's as if the moment these adults (I will not call them grown-ups) enter their cars, they suddenly forget they even have children and that they'd like for their own children to arrive safely at their destinations just as the children they nearly ran down with their cars would like to arrive safely.

When I walk my kids to or from school or to or from their sports or dance classes, I have to risk life and limb forcing myself out into the street playing chicken with the cars whose drivers would likely spontaneously combust were they to yield to a pedestrian and risk getting home or to work 30 seconds later. More often than not, I find myself half way out into the street jumping up and down, waving my arms around like a maniac shouting and cursing at the drivers to go retake their road test - until finally 20 or 30 cars later eventually someone slows down. Likely they've done so, not out of concern for the children who need to cross, but rather the points that would be deducted from their license were they to actually splatter me across the pavement. So someone yields, the nervous children make their way across the street sighing with relief that they are still in one piece - only to have to go through the whole scenario again when they make their way back home again.

Drivers, wake up. You are NOT the center of the universe. Your life will NOT be less meaningful if you are forced to slow down a little to allow a kid to cross the street safely. Yours is NOT the most urgent of tasks and therefore you do NOT have priority over everyone else on the road (or sidewalk). Slow down. Be courteous. You won't be doing anyone any favors - it's the law.