Mortality Rushing Up at 40 MPH

I’ve always considered myself pretty lucky. Not in the sense of winning the office pool or finding $20 bills on the sidewalk, but lucky to be healthy and to have an assortment of friends and family members to see me through. For every awful hand that’s been dealt, I’ve had five good ones. I’m still playing with house money.

That notion changed last weekend, during the frozen seconds that I saw the two-ton van out the passenger window and realized that it wasn’t stopping and that I had nowhere to go.

No illusions of immortality, but I’ve retained that childlike naivete that bad stuff happens to someone else. I’ve had a hundred conversations with friends about what could happen to us, but it’s always been an abstraction. Other people get terminally ill before their time. Other people get shot. Other people die.

Me, I stay out of harm’s way.

Now, I know I could be dead. Instead of having to stretch my imagination as far as it can go to picture it, I only need to re-create the scene from last weekend. Nothing abstract about it. As real as the sound of metal on metal. I’ll be picturing it for quite some time.

I was two blocks from home, on a street I drive every day, this time on the way to get a haircut. All I’ll say is that I saw a green light in the intersection and was driving through it, probably at about 40 mph.

Off to the right, I saw the van. I’m sure my brain processed the fact that if I was going, it should be stopping. The next brain impulse was just as emphatic: It Isn’t Stopping!

Friends and relatives have asked what I remember. The whole thing lasted mere seconds, like flash cards flipping in front of you. A few things, though, linger in my mind.

First was just the sheer disbelief it was happening and, worse yet, that it was going to happen very soon. We drive by rote and seeing the van coming was like being told that black is white and up is down. In other words, this shouldn’t be happening.

Unless the van had wings, I knew I was going to be hit. It looked like a Scud missile bearing down on me. Maybe it would make for a dramatic story to say I said a fast prayer, knowing I was going to be killed, but I don’t remember thinking I was automatically going to die. What I do remember thinking was that I was going to be hit hard enough that I might.

That feeling alone is one I can’t translate to the written word.

*

My life didn’t flash before me. I didn’t scream. I don’t even remember feeling panicky. No, I don’t remember being calm, either. The overriding reality is that there wasn’t time to do much of anything.

I closed my eyes, waited, and heard the crash. Imagine being in your closet and having a firecracker go off. I told my mother later on the phone that after the impact, I was vaguely aware of some kind of tumbling sensation, not physically but in my mind. When thinking about that tumble later, I seem to recall thinking either consciously or subconsciously that my fate was being determined at that moment and that when I opened my eyes, I’d be alive or dead.

The moment of most clarity was when I opened my eyes. I didn’t think I was in heaven; I knew I was alive and remembered thinking I couldn’t believe it but thank-you, thank-you. I smelled smoke and, perhaps from watching too much TV, thought the car was going to burst into flames any second. The air bag had deployed, and I struggled to get out from the seat belt and force the door open.

As they say, I walked away from it.

The kindness from strangers on the street corner was remarkable. Witnesses stayed and waited for police. Passersby with medical training gave me the once-over. A couple on bicycles left me their water bottle. Someone offered to give me a ride home, as the tow truck hauled off my mangled car.

Visiting the car two days later gave me an idea of what happened. Instead of hitting me broadside, the impact occurred nearer the front of the car. Those few feet, that split-second of difference, probably kept me from serious injury or death.

*

Someone in the crowd said the other driver was all right. Surprisingly, I haven’t been angry at the possibility she could have killed me. The only thing that has angered me was picturing my family at my funeral.

So, why do some people get lucky and others don’t? Some friends and relatives want me to have a revelation over this, to accept the fact that I was spared for some reason. If I knew that for a fact, I’d be humbled in ways that would probably change my life.

As yet, I can’t get there. I’m thankful I’m intact, but I can’t celebrate my escape when I know I could walk into a police station any day of the year and read accident reports about other people who were killed. I may have an ego, but it’s not large enough to believe I’ve been singled out to live.

What is as real as the sound of that crash, though, has been sharing intimacies with family members. Granted, they didn’t want to fork out the dough to attend my funeral, but their happiness seems to go beyond not having to do so. I think we’ve all agreed we have lots more to say to each other, a lot more memories and good times to share, and that my death would have put a big crimp in those plans.

Lucky to be alive? Blessed to be alive?

Whatever. I’ll take it.

Now, on the other hand, if you’re talking about a guy who has family and friends he would hate to leave prematurely, that’s a no-brainer.

I’m lucky and blessed.