I have decided that I should never ride in a car as a passenger if my daughter is driving.
The last time(before Friday's accident)I rode in a car with her driving, she ran into the pole outside of a local CVS. Not that she is a bad driver or anything because clearly this wreck was not her fault.
Every time she drives me some place, the sound of steel & plastic crunching follows us. 8-(
Since the high school had a half day on Friday, we were going to close her bank account at the local bank and then go to the statewide bank and open a new account there in preparation for her leaving for college in August.
Well, we finished errand #1 and were on our way to the other bank to open an account. We were at the intersection they call "The Triangle" around these parts. It's a 4 way intersection but one of the roads comes in from an angle, so there is a piece of land there that is triangular shaped.
Get it?
Good.
So we are sitting waiting for the light to turn green....we are pointing to the west. A semi-truck blows through the intersection on the road perpendicular to ours, while their traffic light is yellow....you can see their light from my angle in the car. I make a comment about that truck going so fast and through a yellow light.
Then our light turns green.
And the daughter stars out into the intersection, heading to turn to the left, to proceed southbound down the road, in the direction that the semi just came from.
I had my head turned to the left, looking at daughter and daughter was looking ahead but a bit to the left, in the direction she was pointing the car in.
I saw the car coming right at us past daughter's profile....it wasn't slowing down and it was going at least 40 mph.
I made a noise or said something like "Look!" or "Oh!"
Daughter looked and I said "Brace!" or at least I was thinking that and trying to get it out before the car hit us.
It was like a dream.....seeing the car come right at us and it seemed like everything slowed down in time....the car took forever before it actually hit.
While I was trying to spit some warning out I braced myself on the dashboard with my right arm/hand and with my purse strap on my left arm I grabbed for my daughter to hold onto her. I guess it was my maternal reflex to protect my kid kicking in.
Everything appeared to continue at a slow motion rate of speed until we stopped moving.
The car hit us on the front corner and left front side of the car, just in front of the driver's side door, as the driver tried to swerve to the left of us.
On the initial impact, daughter's head hit the rearview mirror and it fell into her lap. I also hit something as we were flung to the right...maybe the latch were you click the shoulder harness of the seatbelt into the door frame. Whatever it was I hit into it twice eventually, because I have 2 matching monster bruises next to each other, with a strip of non-bruised arm flesh between them.
Here's the right side of the car....the side that didn't get hit directly! Hubs had to go remove some things of ours from the car and I had him snap some photos....
And here's the front of the car.....you can't see the damage to the impact site very well but everything is pushed to the right, the front left bumper is pushed up into the headlight and the frame is pushed toward the windshield. But hey, the windshield wipers still worked!lol....
After the initial impact we got thrown to the left. Daughter hit her head again on the front this time. I banged my left shin into the floor gear console. I also banged my left knee into something as I have a huge bruise on the side of my knee as well.
Our car was pushed a few yards and then got spun 180 degrees, so we were pointing directly opposite the direction we were headed before the impact.
After we came to a stop on this not so fun amusement ride, we looked at each other and asked if the other was ok. Daughter picked the rear view mirror off the floor, where it had rolled after it fell off her lap and said, "Well this won't be useful now."
Well...duh!
The car's motor was still running so I told her to shut the car off. I looked down and the gear shifter was laying sort of sideways. Daughter couldn't get the key out of the ignition because she couldn't get the car out of drive. Shifters don't work very well when they are sideways it seems.
I then pushed my door open(it was jammed and didn't budge at first)and jumped out of the car and told Daughter to get out of the car immediately....in case it decided to blow up or something.lol
The car that hit us, after impact had continued to travel around us, into one of the opposing traffic lanes and then she steered back to the right and stopped in front of us on the road.
We stumbled over to the right edge of the road away from the wreck site.
And I began to make phone calls.
Called Hubs, got voice mail.....of all times!
I called the insurance agent.....his office was 2 buildings away from where I was standing. I walked a block down the road so I could read his phone number off his sign and call him.
So I'm talking to the cop, the tow truck guy, the fire truck guy(they had to clean the roadway), the other rescue squad guy who stopped to help, while trying to get Daughter and the 16 year old new driver who hit us to exchange the proper information.
Being the older, wiser mom, I had to remain calm.....or at least appear so.....and keep these two teens from falling apart.
Since this 16 yr old driver of the other car was alone....after the friend she was taking home got out of the car and walked home and left her there alone....I tried to settle her down, ask her if she was ok and told her that even though she could move her car off the street after the accident that it was a good idea to have her parents have someone look at the car since it seemed to be leaking something from under the hood.
Always a mother to somebody..... ;-)
#1 son came to pick me up after the ambulance took daughter to the ER. She's 18 so I didn't have to go with her and Hubs left work early to go to the hospital to be with her. At this point, after the site was cleared and the teens were being looked after, my nerves started getting the best of me so I thought it best I get home.
About an hour after getting home and icing my huge leg bruise my muscles started to relax and I started to feel very sore from all the tension in my body.
I took a painkiller and went to bed.
I woke up Saturday even more sore with more lovely bruises. While my neck was fine every other muscle in my body was aching.
Luckily, daughter checked out fine at the hospital with only 2 bumps to her head.
I'm not experiencing more soreness so I think I've turned the corner to feeling better now.
Daughter wanted to go out with her friends that same night! Kids.....too resilient for their own good.
Some things that happened here that were 'good'.....maybe I don't mean
good since being in an accident has no good parts, but if it did, these would be the good things about it.
*We were wearing seat belts. When we left the house to drive to the first bank, daughter had chided me about not putting on the seat belt....so I had. She always wears hers because she knows I'd kill her if she didn't.
Sometimes if I am just driving around our teeny tiny town I forget to put it on. Those days are over! ;-)
*The car behind us at the light was driven by a rescue squad guy. Not only did he see the whole thing and serve as a witness that that light was green(since the teen driver of the other car kept claiming that her light was still yellow and that she didn't run a red light!), but he pulled into the intersection behind our car when we stopped and turned on his flashing bar, donned his reflective vest and began directing traffic so no one got run over too.
*That the semi-truck that blew threw the yellow light wasn't a little bit slower and had come through the intersection 5 seconds later. If it had, we most certainly would be pancake ex-people at this moment.
*I felt something when we got hit.....like someone holding us from behind and pushing us down into our seats. Maybe it was centrifugal force or the G-force or something equally scientifically explained away but I think it was my mother's spirit keeping us from becoming human projectiles at that moment. This had been her car originally that we were in and since she died, I've always felt her presence in it.
Whatever it was, I am thankful for it and that I am still here today to bitch and whine about my life. 8-)
The car, on the other hand, is toast.
We are still waiting to hear from our insurance adjuster guy, but the tow guy said from his experience given the age of the car, it will be totaled.
And we won't get enough money for it to buy another car similar to it...even if we could find a car this brand, this old, in this good shape with only 90K miles on it.
We had hoped that this car would get through another 3 years, since #2 son turns 16 next Feb. and needs a car to learn to drive on and then get to and from his part time job that he will get after he learns to drive.
This was also the car that #1 son was leaving for his summer job in on this coming Friday. Now the older two teens have no car to get to and from their summer employment, which means Hubs and I will have to make even more trips across the state this summer as they come and go between home and the camp they work at.
Since we won't be needing a car for another 6 months or so, there's not much point to buy & insure another car right now. If we had a car, the teens would use it this summer but after summer is over it would sit until next year sometime.
We'll probably put whatever we get from the insurance company in the bank for later when/if we do need to replace the car.
And yes, I got right back in a car on Saturday...my version of getting back on a horse after you fall off. ;-)
Sluggy
A set of plastic Cowboys and Indians that belonged to #1 son when he was 4 or 5. While I might be tempted to hang onto them forever, #1 son doesn't have nearly as many sentimental bones in his body.
