{Before I get started, I know you’ve all been waiting anxiously to hear about the fate of my AC adapter. I found it as soon as I powered down the laptop last night. Whew!)
So, kids. Gather ’round for story time. Because I do so love a good yarn, this is going to be long. You’d expect no less from me, though, so I assume this will not be a problem. However, if you’re antsy (and I’m sympathetic to that, since I generally hate cliffhangers), here’s the Reader’s Digest version: I had a wreck yesterday afternoon involving only my car (praise allah), both me and the hound are just fine, and the car is going to need work. {/plot summary}
I left Mountain Home Saturday afternoon shortly before 1 p.m. I had been aiming for noonish, but a series of events outside my control conspired to delay my shoving off. This, of course, is par for the course, so I was not surprised. Just, you know, ready to leave.
The trip went well for the first few hours. To be sure, there were an awful lot of very S-L-O-W people on the roads yesterday, and they always seemed to appear before me right *after* I’d made it through a super-swell passing opportunity. I had doped up Rags real nice with some Benadryl before we left (a new experiment necessitated by the fact that he wanted to stop every 30 minutes on our way to Mountain Home the week before), so he was a little less whiny than normal in the backseat. (Notice I did not say he wasn’t whiny at all. That’s not in the hound’s genetic code.) We were making good time and I was happy.
Before I’d left, I’d checked the weather a couple of times. I knew there was a strong front moving eastward, and had left a little early to try to outrun the (heaviest) rain. I was doing pretty well, actually. I stopped at McDonald’s in Kennett, Mo. (I love making jokes about the “show-me” state, incidentally, but I’ll refrain from now so as not to detract from the storytelling) to fetch myself a big ol’ milkshake.
Given that I have ostensibly given up sugar, this may seem a bit bizarre, but it was part of my day-long attempts to outsmart this very peculiar and, quite frankly, rather annoying throat/voice thing that has been plaguing me for the last several days. My throat is a wee bit swollen and scratchy, but not at all sore, and my voice has been slowly deteriorating. My tonsils are generally an excellent early-warning system for all manner of head cold/sinus infection maladies, but generally they only give about 48 hours’ notice. Yesterday was day five, with no additional symptoms having appeared. So, I resorted to a host of tried-and-true Liz home remedies to thwart the evil throat/voice thing. Among them were near-nonstop sucking on cough drops (I think I now *must* reek of cherry-flavored methol), gulping down OJ, and (in theory) drinking a milkshake.
Unfortunately, McDonald’s milkshake machine was out of order, so I had to settle for an ice cream cone. It wasn’t my first choice, but I sucked it up and accepted the cruel twist of fate.
OK, so now I have to come to the part of the story that may reflect somewhat poorly upon me. Please, don’t judge too much, mmmkay? At various random times during my trek across east Arkansas/west Tennessee yesterday, I was receiving — and yes, at times sending — text messages. I know, I know, lecture me about this. I get it. However, you simply must understand that I am a very careful and safe and aware driver. I just don’t put myself in danger. When I’m texting or, you know, say, snapping pictures in the car? It’s always when there aren’t cars in my immediate proximity or when the road’s free of, say, torrential downpours. Really. I am not stupid. I’m a fucking awesome driver. Really.
Still, there were a couple of moments where I had my ice cream cone in one hand and was composing a short text message. That wasn’t, um, brilliant. I’m confessing only so you know that I’m being completely honest when I say that, when what happened actually happened, I wasn’t doing any of that shit. Really.
OK. So, I get to Dyersburg, Tennessee, and the heavens completely opened up. It was completely random — I was driving along in overcast but not rainy weather, and then it was comin’ on a toad strangler. Boom! I thought to myself, “Self, this really sucks.” And I remembered back to the TV special on safe driving my parents made me watch as a preteen, wherein Angela Lansbury and others gave very helpful pointers about dangerous driving conditions, and that they said that the first few minutes’ of rain are the most dangerous, because the oil on the streets bubbles up to the top and makes things slick. After it’s been raining a bit, the oil has washed off, but one should be especially careful at the very beginning of a shower.
I swear, every time I’m driving and it starts raining, I remember this. (I know. That’s weird.) And so when the heavens opened, I slowed way the hell down and scooted over to the left lane. I can’t really explain to right now *why* I moved to the left lane, except that I remember there were cars in the right lane in fairly close proximity, and because of the monsoon around us, the rain + the water they were splashing up was making visibility very difficult. At any rate, I was the only one in the left lane, and there were maybe two or three cars within a comfortable radius around me.
What happened next is a blur. I remember going into a skid/swirl. Later, I figured out that in the road, there was a place where water was pooling quickly, and very obviously I was hydroplaning. But it was all happening in slow motion. My car started to turn wildly to the left. I spun around two full turns. My instincts are excellent and I did exactly what you’re supposed to — I turned into the skid and didn’t immediately slam on the breaks. (My instincts are so well honed thanks to the years I spent riding a go cart in snow & ice and intentionally doing donuts. I am very good at controlling motor vehicles in less-than-ideal circumstances, I assure you.)
Even though I had slowed way the hell down, though, I was on an interstate and wasn’t exactly going slow, so I had a pretty unfavorable amount of inertia working against me. After doing a couple of twirls on the highway (and how nobody hit me, I will never, ever know), my next adventure was a full spin through the median, which was not perfectly flat. As I said, all of this is a blur to me, but I do remember seeing a big ass pole coming at me alarmingly quickly — it was an interstate sign pole in the median — and thinking, “If I hit that, it will be *really* bad.” To be perfectly honest, I really did think I was going to hit it pretty much head-on, and in the split second I had to ponder that possibility, I had a wee bit of a panic. As it turns out (and I honestly can’t tell you 100% what did happen), I believe I did knick the pole with my rear passenger bumper, which provided just enough jostle to send my car flailing into the opposite side of the interstate. Yes, that’s right, into incoming lanes of traffic.
Again, this was all happening kind of quickly, so I didn’t have time to ponder the greater arc of my travels across the highway. But it did occur to me, in a fleeting way, that sitting in a car careening out of control into lanes of onbound traffic wasn’t precisely my idea of a good way to spend a Saturday afternoon. I saw cars coming towards me, and had another thought akin to, “If the car stops in the middle of the highway, those people aren’t going to be able to avoid hitting me, and that would be really, really bad.”
Amazingly, my car didn’t come to a stop until we’d cleared both lanes of traffic and made it to the shoulder. In fact, I was actually slightly *off* the shoulder. As we left the asphalt, the rear passenger tire fell off (along with its break and several other parts, I’m led to believe).
Once everything had stopped moving, I took a couple of deep breaths and assessed the situation. There was smoke in the car, which sent me into a slight panic until I noticed that the side curtain airbag had deployed (another piece of evidence that makes me thing I did make at least marginal contact with the big ass pole). The other thing I noticed right away was that Rags had made it to the front seat. Mind you, he had been resting comfortably in the back seat and had been, in fact, asleep when all this began. There is a fairly sizeable barrier (especially given his agility and leg length) between the front and back seat. I don’t mean to suggest the poor hound went flying through the air. I’m just pretty sure that when the airbag exploded, he completely fucking lost it and found a damned way to the safety of the front seat.
I got out of the car and did a quick walkaround. With the exception of the fact that I was missing an entire tire (which was helpfully laying right behind the car), everything actually looked surprisingly okay. The car started up, so that was good.
The rest of the day was far less interesting by comparison. I made a series of phone calls, and was aided by the rescue efforts of a very wonderful and sympathetic Dyersburg trooper, whose first observation after making sure me and Rags were fine, was that it was a MIRACLE my car didn’t roll over. At least one person (Daniel) has suggested this is likely because I have a relatively safe car and, as I said, have the kind of instincts necessary to prevent a roll.
There were a lot of miracles, though. It’s a miracle I didn’t hit anyone on my side of the road. It’s a total miracle I didn’t hit that big ass pole head-on. It’s a miracle I didn’t roll when I was careening out of control in the grass. And the biggest miracle of all is that I didn’t come into direct contact with cars on the other side of the highway.
I really cannot believe I walked away with nary a scratch. I’m not even *sore* today. Rags is a bit emotionally traumatized (to say the least!), but we are just fine.
So, I’m finding it hard to be at all upset, angry, or bothered by all of this. If anything, I feel like I’ve been exceedingly lucky.
I made a series of phone calls to potential rescuers. Daniel was on his way back to Nashville yesterday, too, and when all this happened was about an hour west of Little Rock. He was more than willing to drive up to Dyersburg to fetch me, the hound, and all my shit, and I was (and am) extremely grateful to him for that. In addition to all the blessings wrapped up in the incident yesterday, I feel doubly blessed that I have people like that in my life. I’m a very lucky girl.
It was my parents who insisted — they would not hear of any other alternative — that they come to Dyersburg. My mom drove like a bat out of hell, I’m pretty sure, to get to Dyersburg in record time. (She even passed up $1.21 gas in Paragould. Can you believe that shit?!?!) They came with two cars (my mom’s Avalon and my dad’s little red truck) and left me with the Avalon. (They then went back to Mountain Home together in my dad’s truck.) I was then able to proceed onward to Nashville, and got in a little after 1 a.m. last night.
I’m still in awe. Even though I know I should be feeling shocked or upset or whatever, all I can say is that today’s probably the best day I’ve had in a really, really long time… I know better than to take good things for granted, and I am exceedingly grateful to be sitting here in my big green chair, typing on my laptop, and not be lying in some hospital in Dyersburg (or worse). The car will be fine. (Eventually.)
So. There’s my story. Thanks for reading. And thanks again to the people who made the day bearable… the ones I’ve already named, and the ones I haven’t. I feel really blessed to have you in my life.
Wow, that's just… Wow. Glad you made it out in such good shape!