A Close Call...REAL Close.

In the blink of an eye. In an instant. Before I knew it. All of a sudden (happy Abs?!). I hear people say things like this all the time. Now I’m in the club. I had a really close call this afternoon on my way home from work. Here’s how it went down...

1:15pm, driving home from work, four lane highway. I’m in the left hand lane behind a crappy little tan colored car. I’m doing 55 mph, and am a good distance behind the car ahead of me. The car in front of me throws a bunch of trash, candy wrappers, a paper cup...and handful of junk, out of the window. Rude right?! I mean, you don’t just throw shit out of your car window. This isn’t St. Thomas after all. It’s simply not ok to be that gross. This is beautiful, green Oregon; DON’T LITTER! A few minutes after the trash confetti, this person’s car begins to creep over into the right hand lane. No blinker. It BARELY squeezes in between two vehicles in that lane. So, at this point, I’m convinced that this driver is not only a littering non-recycler, but a really big ass. But he keeps going, onto the shoulder. So now I’m thinking he is having some kind of emergency and is needing to pull over in a hurry. But no, he doesn’t stop. He drives through a shallow ditch and starts back up the other side. At this point I have no idea what the hell is going on, but now I’m worried. I certainly don’t want to see this litter bug wreck right in front of me. I lay on the horn in hopes of, well, I don’t really know what I was hoping. It just seemed like the thing to do. In a split second his car came shooting back out of the ditch and narrowly missed the front of my car. I slammed on the brakes. Litter bugs car goes spinning out of control into the center lane, making two full circles. The car was actually on ONLY two wheels at one point, when it was making the second circle...and I thought for sure it was going to start rolling, across all lanes, into oncoming traffic. It didn’t. The car landed back on all four tires and headed directly for me. Again, I slammed on my brakes and braced myself for what was sure to be a terrible impact. The air was filled with a combination of his black tire smoke and dust still settling from the previous off road excursion. I can feel every muscle in my body tightly, my antilock brakes grabbing and releasing trying to slow my car down. I can see this other driver with crystal clear, slow motion type vision. Young, mid twenties. No shirt, muscular, tan, but with a slight sun burn. Dark hair, shaved in a military style buzz. Our vehicles collided. The front passenger side of his car hit my front drivers side.  Yet the impact felt somehow soft. Cushioned. Like the bumper cars you ride at the fair when you are a kid. I try to get out of my car but can’t as my seat belt has locked up. I looked in my rear view mirror to see if I was about to get hit from behind, and see a handful of cars all braking and swerving to avoid hitting me and each other. I look back out the windshield just in time to see this guy, the other driver, back up AND TAKE OFF! The bastard just drove away! In a hurry! Still unable to get out of my car I drive over onto the shoulder of the road. My seat belt releases, finally, when I turn my car off. I jump out and head further onto the shoulder to start dry heaving. Sorry, graphic I know, but true. There is a white car backing down the highway on the shoulder. It’s the car that was in the rear when this guy drifted through their lane. An older man with a huge red beard starts running down the road towards me, yelling for me to sit down and asking me if I’m ok. I’m shaking something fierce. He says to me, “Look at your car”! “I saw that guy hit you...and LOOK at your car”! I turn around and look at my car for the first time. I almost passed out. BARELY A SCRATCH! Seriously, a teensy sliver of red painted fiberglass, no bigger than a shred of paper is hanging from my bumper. This man’s wife jumps out of the driver side of their car and comes rushing toward me, sobbing hysterically with a handful of tissues pressed to her face, and hugs me tighter than I think I’ve ever been hugged. She is way more upset than I am at this point. She’s talking so fast and frantically that I can barely understand her. She says, “When that guy drifted in front of our car he looked like he was completely asleep or passed out. We watched the whole thing happen and thought for sure you both wouldn’t make it considering how fast your car’s were going when you hit”. She asks me again if I am ok, and then excuses herself saying she needs to go sit down. Her husband, who had been holding me up practically, let go of me to go inspect my car. He checked all the tires and got down on his hands and knees, head shaking in disbelief, as he inspected the lack of damage to my car. He walked back over to me, put his hand on my back and asked me if I was ready to go. I told him no, that I needed a few minutes to calm down, and thanked him for his kindness. He said, that he would stay there with me until I was ready to get back into my car. We stood there for probably two minutes in total silence, him with his arm around me, until I said I thought I was ready to go. He made me wait for all passing traffic, and then helped me into my car, reminding me to drive careful. My car is a wreck on the inside. Not that it was super clean to begin with...but all sorts of things have found their way onto the dash, my purse is wedged up under the glove box on the passenger side, my freshly made green apple smoothie from Dutch Bros splattered across the interior. I put my seat belt on and just sat there for another five minutes. And just like that, it was over. Everyone had left, and I was alone in my car wondering what the hell had just happened. 

It’s crazy how much stuff ones mind is capable of processing in only a few seconds. I mean, this whole event COULDN’T have lasted more than five seconds from the time his car came shooting back out of the ditch and into traffic. No, my life didn’t flash before my eyes. Yet, I remember thinking...I’m going to wreck. This is going to be bad. I wonder how bad it’s going to hurt to get hit in the face with an airbag. Man, my dash is dusty. Why isn’t my car slowing down fast enough? What is that terrible noise? I wonder if my family will sneak Zipper into the hospital to see me? I still owe fifteen thousand dollars on this car! How will my family reach Andrew in Afghanistan to let him know I’ve been in an accident?

So, it’s been nearly ten hours since the accident, and the soreness is starting to set in. My braking leg feels like it ran a marathon on it’s own from pressing so hard on the brakes. Both arms and upper back are killing me from bracing for the impact. And, I have one hell of a migraine from all the instant stress I’m sure. But what’s hurting the most...I feel like no one believes me. I don’t know what I expect necessarily, but an un-ruffled “Oh man, are you serious?” isn’t it. My own father didn’t even want to talk to me about it once he found out that my car wasn’t totaled. “Well, you couldn’t have gotten into a wreck if you’re car isn’t totaled Brandy.” How could I and WHY would I make this up?! I can kind of understand why no one believes me, considering there is practically no damage whatsoever to my car. But I can’t explain it. I’m no accident scene mathematician...but common sense tells me that, considering all the variables, neither one of us should have walked away (let alone drove) from this. Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful beyond all belief, but I simply don’t understand why this wasn’t worse. I mean, the whole thing happened in an instant...but I’m pretty sure I would have noticed if Edward Cullen himself zipped in to cushion the impact (sorry, I’m a Twilight fan and not afraid to admit it) of our vehicles colliding! 

Call it what you will...divine intervention, luck, a miracle, a super resilient fiberglass bumper from Mazda...or, call me a liar. I don’t know. I’m just grateful to be sitting here on my bed, albeit sore, typing this blog entry. And even more grateful that I didn’t have Zipper with me. What a way to end a shitty week.