After a long ass time of not posting, I'm going to go ahead and account the details of my car accident. I'm well aware I came out of the situation extremely lucky, because my injuries were minor and hopefully temporary. The whole situation, however, was still horrifying and depressing, and I'm going to try my best not to sound somber and morose, but rather light-hearted and aloof. To steal a trick from my favorite hilarious blog Hyperbole and a Half, if I ever sound depressing or like I'm ranting imagine my voice sounding like cookie monster and it will be so ridiculous and comical all depression will be removed.
So, I guess the beginning of the story is me heading home from work at about 9pm on Saturday, October 23rd. I was in no particular rush when I came to the turn that enters my apartment. This turn is in a median which will later be a huge deal since the lack of a light at this location makes it extremely difficult to place blame on anyone but the person turning. Seeing no cars, the nearest at the light down the street, which is at least a quarter mile away, I turned into my complex. Well into my turn in my peripheral I see a car coming at me FAST. I mean like 90 fast. I slam the gas to try and move out of the way fast enough, but alas, I'm not exaggerating at all when I say he was going 90 mph on a 45 and I heard the horrifying screech of tires before the inevitable impact.
This part is really hard to describe. I don't know exactly what happened inside my car other than on impact I must have closed my eyes, because something hit my head on the right side, and I literally have no idea what it was, and don't remember registering pain. I know it was fucking fast. I felt the impact and the feel of spinning (like when you do a donut in a car) and next thing I know, I'm in my car, which is resting on the sidewalk next to my complex. All of this was instantaneous, which is why I think at the time I was just shocked and totally calm.
Like I said it's hard to place all my thoughts at the moment except I know I didn't realize how bad the crash was until much later. Immediately after the crash all I remember was fixing my glasses, which had been partially knocked off my face, and hoping they weren't broken (this is actually something I recalled a day or so later, which is one among many reasons I know something hit my head, even though i don't remember the sensation, or what the hell it was). A bit after checking my glasses I think the next absolutely trivial, spaced out thought I had was noticing my hard plastic Starbucks tumbler that I had in my hand was on the floor, and had broken a little, but the contents hadn't spilled. That, and the transponder for passing the toll I had in my car was DESTROYED along with the entire windshield.
I knew there was a cop car directly behind me when I had made the turn, so as I now opened my car door to step out, I looked back and saw said cop with his lights on turning into the scene of the accident and heard sirens coming from down the street. As I sat in my car about to get out, I touched my head and looked down to see blood all over my hand (another reason I know something hit the right side of my head) and this is were I started to, very slowly, come to the conclusion everything was not alright.
My immediate panic was that I wanted badly to get a hold of Erich, since a small hysteria was setting in and I was literally right in front of my complex. I stood up and turned around aware that I had forgotten my cell phone, still shocked into a quasi-calm state. I had a very pressing urge to just walk inside to get him and come back, but knew there was no way that was happening, and remember vaguely mumbling about someone please getting my fiance from inside. This went on for no more than 10 seconds before the police officers began shouting at me to please sit the fuck down, which is understandable, since I didn't know it at the time, but I looked like an injured hot mess, my lip swollen and bloody and blood running down the side of my face.
(They were yelling at me and the other driver who also chose to get out of his car at this moment and stumbled in the police's direction. He seemed spaced and the police were screaming at him to sit down when he collapsed at their feet. He later said he was fine so I don't know why he fell, other than shock, and many ask if he was drunk, but again, I don't know. It would make sense, since we was going Fucking 90 on a 45 at 9pm.)
This is when a hysterical girl on the sidewalk in front of me approached me practically crying and says, "OMG I'm so freaked out right now, holy crap! Are you ok?!" to which I calmly replied, "Can I borrow your cell phone? My fiance's inside there" *points* Again something I hadn't realized at the time, since I was unaware of the details, but the poor girl was probably terrified because apparently both cars had spun in the air on impact and landed where they did (I knew I spun, but had assumed in was on the ground and not in the air) and I now realize she came extremely close (about 50 feet close) to being crushed by my car when it landed. She lent me her phone and I called Erich.
I recall being calm and somewhat together as I called Erich and tried to tell him to come outside, but he says I was incoherent until I said something to the effect of "Someone hit me. HARD." and started crying as I had just realized my head was still bleeding, and I was in a significant amount of pain, and there was quite a commotion now around the accident, which I was realizing more and more could have been fatal. (remember to read this like cookie monster)
Erich later told me he heard the accident from inside the apartment and thought, "Holy crap, someone just got fucked up." Then he got my phone call and once he realized it was me ran outside barefoot, which he immediately realized was possibly a mistake because the entire exterior was sparkling with broken glass. He hopped over the hood of my car, which was wedged firmly into a chain-link fence along the sidewalk, and gave me a hug to calm me down. Upon realizing I wasn't dying anytime soon he excused himself to go inside and grab shoes and the digital camera since he'd seen the damage that I couldn't see because I couldn't move from my side of the car without several public service officials shouting to sit down... again.
At this point I'm going to go ahead and take a break. To be continued...
