Really? Deadly?

    This sign that I spotted in Washington struck me as overly dramatic: “Falling Can Be Deadly. Please Stay on the Trail.” So if I leave the trail, I’m in danger? And if I stay on the trail, I’m safe? If only life were so simple.     
     Here are signs others shared with me that made me chuckle:     Molly wrote about a large billboard in Utah that announces, “Stop and Eat and Get Gas.” No thank you.
     Pat says an Oklahoma sign warns, “Hitchhikers may be escaping inmates.”    
     Terry laughed about the name of a South Dakota graveyard: Canton Lutheran Cemetery. To be buried there, how do you prove you’re Lutheran?         
     In the Utah desert, Julie drove by a wooden sign proclaiming, “Forrest Gump ended his cross country run at this spot.”     
     I puzzled over this sign beside a Colorado parking lot: “Caution - Children Ahead.” Am I supposed to watch that I don’t harm them, or that they don’t harm me?     
     Whatever signs cross your path, I hope you never have a deadly fall, that those who hitchhike into your life aren’t convicts, and that you don’t come across children who harm you.     
​     And perhaps in today’s heated political climate we could all use this Nebraska sign promoting civility: “When push comes to shove, don’t.”