I'm Screaming MERCY At The Top Of My Lungs
Thing the First: THIS HAD BETTER BE THE BOTTOM OMGWTFBBQENOUGHENOUGHENOUGHENOUGH.
Thing the Second: Everybody is fine. Absolutely, totally, and completely fine. Promise.
Except, well, my car isn't fine.
Soooo . . . I grew up in North Dakota. I learned to drive in North Dakota. I took my driving test in the middle of a blizzard. In fact, I got to skip the parallel parking portion of the test because it was snowing too hard to see the cars in front and back of the parking space. What I'm saying is I know how to drive in less than ideal conditions. It's second nature to me. Even in retrospect, I don't know that I would do anything differently. Apparently this evening was just destined to end the way it did.
Which, again, I repeat Thing the First: WTF DOES THE UNIVERSE WANT FROME ME? I WILL DO IT. TWICE.
Anyway, it was a pretty typical Thursday. Alexis rolled off the school bus and straight into my car so that she could go to dance class. Mr. Husband was off of work today and was going to accompany us, but decided at the last second to stay home to work on a few things. There was a discussion about me taking his car which went a little like this, "HAHAHAHAH! No! Your car sucks in the snow."
I stand by that statement.
Once dance class was over, Alexis and I swung through the bank drive-thru and then headed home. Now, the roads were lousy. Truly lousy. In response, I had slowed to well below the speed limit and more than quadrupled my following distance. Still, it was mostly an easy drive home as we live in a part of town that takes clearing the roads very seriously. They do a fantastic job. Truly.
Except for that little part of the main road right in front of where the snowplows get parked. THAT part of the road wasn't so fantastic today.
I saw the brake lights in plenty of time to stop. I was driving 20 mph under the posted speed limit for that road, so, truly, I wasn't thinking anything was about to happen. But as I pressed on the brake pedal, I heard the sounds of ABS kicking in and . . . nothing.
WHAT GOOD IS ABS IF IT DOES NOTHING?
Ahem.
With Alexis in the back seat and me driving, my beloved car that we bought brand new just a year ago slid . . . and slid . . . and slid . . . and slid. We slid easily 200 feet.
Somewhere around the 150 foot mark, I realized we weren't going to stop in time. I surveyed the situation. Again, we weren't moving all that fast, so I had time to think about it. There were two cars in front of me. The front one had its turn signal on as the driver was trying to turn left into their driveway. There was another car coming from the opposite direction.
And there was us. Not stopping.
I looked to the right and tried to mentally measure the berm. That particular road is a two-lane road with houses on the left and a deep ditch on the right. There's a creek at the bottom of the ditch. But! But! There looked to be just enough flat land for me to maybe creep through on the right and maybe only hit a mailbox. Hitting a mailbox is WAY better than hitting a car, right? Right.
The thing I forgot to consider is that the narrow span of flat land was just as slippery as the road. My car slid and slid and slid and . . .
BAM. Alexis and I were upside-down in the car.
In the ditch. In the creek.
We hung there for a minute completely disoriented. Fortunately, a good samaritan (which, if anybody knows who it was, PLEASE CONTACT ME) had somehow found his way down the ditch and was standing in the water with a flashlight. I carefully undid my seat belt and then moved to the back to get Alexis free.
Oh, Thing the Third: My kid HATES that I make her sit in a full-back booster seat with a five-point harness. She says all of her friends get to have the little booster seats that just use the car's seatbelt. NOW SHE'S KEEPING THAT FIVE-POINT HARNESS UNTIL SHE'S THIRTY. See also: we flipped completely upside-down and she was TOTALLY fine. Another possible factor: she doesn't wear a coat in the car, so her seatbelt is always nice and snug. Paranoia is my friend.
Back to the story . . . eventually Alexis and I managed to crawl out of the car and then mountain-climbed our way out of the ditch with a rope and the help of a whole lot of people. Now that I've been on the other side of that ditch, I need to call it a "ditch" because it's a 90-degree drop for about ten feet.
But we're fine.
Totally fine.
My car isn't.
It was too dark to see just how bad the damage to the car is, but I'm thinking "upside-down in a creek" isn't the start of a story that has a happy ending.
Let's review, shall we?
December: I was laid off from my job without severance.
January. There's a thing that isn't fit for the internet, but trust me when I say it's currently looming like a huge brick wall in my life. After that thing, our dog died suddenly. Now I wrecked my car.
This had better be rock bottom because I've had quite enough bad in the past two months. Anybody know any spells or potions or ANYTHING that might break this streak?
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Reader Comments (78)
Thank God you're both okay! I've been trying to convince God and the universe that Mr 2012 needs to let go of all his grudges towards us and accept our hand of friendship... Sending across same prayers for you and your family too... Hope each day from now keeps getting better than the previous one for all of you...
Thank God you're both okay! I've been trying to convince God and the universe that Mr 2012 needs to let go of all his grudges towards us and accept our hand of friendship... Sending across same prayers for you and your family too... Hope each day from now keeps getting better than the previous one for all of you...
Ditto everything above. CanNOT imagine how frightening that was, how tremendous the relief when you realized Alexis was OK. Wish I could do something for you guys to make it all better, but will just send you a big hug, from one non-hugger to another (and one for Wayne, too...).
So glad you both are ok!
Sending you positive thoughts from around the globe!! Not cool when stuff like that keeps happening.
Oh man - that SUCKS! I'm glad you're both OK, though.
Holy guacamole! You didn't say something out loud like, "Gee I wish I had something more dramatic to blog about!" now did you? I'm so glad you're OK. I don't let my kids wear their coats in the car, either (I am also close buddies with paranoia) but my big boys both use boosters even though most of their friends don't. AT ALL.
How is Alexis handling it? Is she OK? Scared?
I am so sorry to hear about your string of bad luck. But thank God everyone is OK! Sometimes life just isn't fair. I have had spells like that where in a matter of a few months I have had a close death in the family, flood in my home, loved one diagnosed with permenant illness, and major relationship issues. I thought I was going to go crazy. Eventually things started to get better and I realized that I had the love and support of family. You have both that and, if all of these posts are any indication, lots of support and prayers coming to you from your internet friends - mine included.
Holy crap! So glad you and Alexis are ok.
So glad that you are ok. I started reading and thought "oh crap she got in a fender bender rear end accident" never expecting what was coming next.. I gasped as I read and my husband was like "what happened". I will say that I have forwarded your post to many of my friends and posted on message boards as a great example of why keeping kids in 5 pt harness as long as you can is so important. I hope your experience changes at least one parent to keep or put their kid in 5 pt for as long as possible.
I don't know you personally (obviously), but I follow your tweets and read your blog. So sorry for your run of bad luck and sending good vibes across the Universe (actually just Pittsburgh!) that things start going your way!
Oh my goodness. Someone is looking out for you. To sunny, right-side-up skies ahead!
My grandmother used to say "everything happens for a reason" and most of the time she was right. However, as she got older she used to end that by saying "When I get to Heaven, God and I are going to have long sit-down so he can clue me in on some of the reasons!" So glad you are both safe and sound, and to repeat a previous poster "it can only go up from here!"
Oh my goodness! What an experience. I'm so glad to hear you are both OK. How is Alexis about the whole thing, now? I hope it doesn't impact her too negatively in a long-term way. Or you.
And I hope things start getting better for you. It seems like if "NOTHING" happens for a while, it will be a good thing, in comparison. Sheesh.
Take care.
Very glad you are both OK. I got into a minor crash with my daughter when she was 3. It's now been 8 years and she still remembers it!
So scary! Glad to hear it was just the car. Cars are replaceable. Fingers crossed for a much improved rest of the year?
Damn! I'm going to be all "silvery-lining" and say that things are actually looking up for you, because you were both okay. It's not working, is it?
Holy Crap! I'm glad you two weren't hurt! And kudos for telling the story in such a calm and ordinary, this-is-how-you-make-yet-another-evil-chocolcatey-desert-that-Kevin-will-drool-over kind of way. In truth it must have been terrifying, at least for a minute.
Maybe your luck has changed and the fact that you survived what could have been truly awful with nary a scratch on the two of you is the turning point... (I hope so, anyway!)
WHOA. SO glad you two came out of it okay.
Also? (((hugs))) I know you're opposed, but in this case, I'm ignoring that.
OMG!!!!! What a freaking nightmare! I'm so glad you are both okay. That in un-freaking-believable!!!! Crazy.
SOOOO glad you are okay!
They say bad things happen in threes, so you've had four. You should be good for a nice Loooooonnnnngggg time now. :)
So glad you guys are okay! Here's my advice in two words:
Voodoo dolls
Trust me, it works. (I'm from Louisiana!)
Seriously, either voodoo dolls or a very large punching bag to get out your much deserved frustration!
What a year this has already been for y'all. Goodness. Doing what I know best, sending up prayers for good vibes to head your way. So glad you are both safe.
Dang! So happy to see that you're both well (apparently exceedingly, in Alexis's case). I've shared this post on fb, with the hopes that all of my foolish friends who are in such a rush to "graduate" their kids to boosters might change their minds...
Safe travels!
onomatopoeia my love.
And if you ever find out that spell, feel free to pass it on.
xx
Holy crap, how scary... very glad you both are okay.
Good lord, woman! So, so, so glad you guys are okay! If I knew of any counterspells, I would have made you use them by now. Seriously. But if you need to hide from all the craziness for awhile, you're always welcome to run away to Tejas for awhile.
This is really scary. I can't even imagine! I am glad you're all okay and really hope this is it... you need some good news!