I was barely a mile away from home on my way to work. The road
I travel has been under construction for years. They recently
added a right lane that leads to an exit onto a highway. The left
lane of the road was backed up because of construction, and
because of the drivers' desire to continue on the road instead of
exiting onto the highway. Since I, being contrary, actually wanted
to get on said highway, I pulled into the right lane when it
appeared, and began to pick up speed, because no one was in
my way. I was accelerating towards the speed limit of 45.
Unbeknownst to me, traffic had left a gap at the next intersection
to allow a woman to turn left. Because the line of cars stopped in
the left lane were not transparent, my impending presence in that
same intersection was unbeknownst to her. The next thing I knew,
there was a large SUV in my path. I just barely had time to utter:
"Holy s--" before the front of my car became a lot shorter.
I sat there for a moment, swearing and breathing the dust and fumes
that accompany airbag deployment. (Have you ever smelled airbag
fumes? I find them hard to describe. A little like burning plastic, but a
bit more acrid. I still can't get the smell out of my nose 24 hours later.)
Suddenly, I desperately wanted out of that car. Unfortunately, the
driver's side door would not open. But I could roll the power window
down (amazing - I guess the batery survived), so I got out Dukes of
Hazzard style. Yeeha!
Since the fire station is very close, a firetruck was there almost
immediately. I was ambulatory, so they saw to the lady in the SUV,
who was conscious but in pain. Shock is weird. I thought to myself,
"Never going to see this car again!" So, of course, I grabbed the
whistles I keep in the map pocket for emergency sessions (not
uncommon...) Then, I started grabbing a few more things which I
definitely didn't need to drag to the hospital, but which my addled
brains thought I'd want later: my raquetball racket, a pair of shoes,
an Aebersol Jazz book, my CD's... What I left were the endorsed
checks I was going to deposit at the bank that day.
The ambulance arrived shortly, and I opted to go to the hospital
to get checked out, though I only seemed to have bruising and
abrasions on my chest, left arm, and right leg. I asked the paramedic
if she wouldn't mind transporting this small pile of stuff with me.
She looked at me strangely, but agreed. So I rode to the hospital
with my pile and the poor lady from the SUV, who was strapped
onto a backboard. In between giving her history to the paramedic
and wincing everytime the ambulance hit a bump, she apologized
for putting her SUV in my path. I apologized for consequently hitting
her poor Pathfinder. I knew in my brain of brains that I couldn't have
prevented it, but I still wouldn't have blamed her for laying about
me with every Gypsy curse she had ever come across. Instead, she
was very nice. She said I reminded her of her coworker named Bill.
(Which must have been a shock: "Why'd Bill just try to kill me? I know
I didn't do that badly on the Johnson contract!")
Now, I'm sad that I lost my car, but glad both the other driver and
myself are relatively OK. I'm just going to be really sore for a few
days. I'm going to miss my car. I loved that car. It was a dark green
1995 Toyota Camry. It was my first car, and I'd driven it for 10 years
and 170,000 miles without any major problems. I hoped to get at least
15 years out of it. I dreamed of seeing that odometer roll over to
200,000. Several years ago, the Y fell off of the back, and instead
of buying a new letter Y, I rearranged the letters to spell "CAR". Many
people thought it clever and amusing. Several times I saw someone
behind me at a stop light pointing it out to their passenger, or showing
their child as they walked by it in the parking lot.
So, in the aftermath, I've realized a few things:
1. Toyota makes a pretty safe car. I'll probably be buying another one.
2. My mother caused me to obsessively wear a seatbelt. Thanks, Mom.
3. SUV's may seem like they give you a better view, but they don't.
4. For the love of God, don't whistle while you drive. You may think
there's time to react, but there isn't! Like I said, I couldn't even get
a proper cussword out before there was an airbag in my way. If
I'd had a whistle in my mouth, they'd still be removing it from my
upper pallet. The best I could have hoped for was to drop the whistle
just before impact, which, according to the laws of gravity, would
have put the whistle between my sternum and the airbag, thereby
worsening my injuries considerably. I can't even imagine what it would
have done to the accident report.
If the car storage facility allows me to take pictures, I may post
some here. I really want to immortalize "CAR". He was a good vehicle.
I hope there's some good Independence Day car sales going on.
)
