Thursday, December 30, 2004 :::
i guess i could have died. that's still hard to take in:
December 26th, 2004, ~2am
around corner too fast. onto curb. into tree. flip. slide a bit. on back like turtle.
out of dat, puneet, and i, i think im the only one who remembers the whole thing vividly. maybe cuz i was in the backseat and was slightly removed from the joystick controlling the video game. thinking about it now, i'm reminded of a motion simulator ride.
it wasn't like ive heard things like that usually are. it wasn't in slow motion. it was regular motion, but i was certainly consicous of the curb comming at us very fast in a way that it shouldn't and being helpless to right the car's direction of momentum. my life didn't flsh before my eyes, though later i did think about how my friends and family would fair if i had died.
it smelled of fireworks. i didn't know what it was. (later i learned / figured out it was from the air bag deployment) there was smoke in the air, too. my first thought was that i needed to get out of the car IMMEDIATELY. there was smoke inside and i didn't want to have to deal with the car catching on fire. i reached for the door handle. i couldn't find it because it didn't exist - i was sitting in the backseat of a coupe.
dat and puneet were still in daze. puneet thought he was dreaming. dat didn't kno we were upside down. "ummm, can we get out?" i said. "scott, are you okay?" they responded. yes. i pleaded again to flee the potential coffin. i tried to yell, but it didn't work. it came out like regular speech instead.
dat was the first to unbuckle. he landed with a thud on the roof of the car. it was just like in the movies when people are getting out of rolled cars. it was funny, to be honest. puneet took note and tried not to land so hard. he landed on his shoulder instead. he ended up separating it. they crawled out of the car to talk to the people who had come running. i was left chillaxin' in the backseat.
i tried to yell at them again to help me out. it came out regular again. dat came back to help me and tried to take headrest off the seat in front of me. i found that a little silly and so pushed his hands away and hit the seat release. it slid forward. i undid belt and didn't fall because my head/neck was resting on the rearview window. i climbed out to safety...
we were all okay. no one was badly injured or dead. amazing. if that tree wasn't there, we would've slid into a truck that was parked behind a chain link fence. maybe the tree saved us from greater injury. what if we had piled into the tree instead of bouncing into it? it could've gone so many different ways. thank goodness for modern safety equipment: seatbelts, safety glass, airbags (front AND side), crumple zones...
ive driven by the spot a few times and every time i look at the wounds on the tree i'm reminded that those are the only wounds... today i drove by and had a vision of an alternate reality. one in which that tree was covered with flowers and pictures. it made me sad and happy. sad for the people in that one. and happy that i'm not there.
that was certainly a night to remember. a night to be thankful. a night to learn. i didn't think i needed a reminder that i was mortal, but out of other possibilities, i'll take this one. i'm glad i'm still here. i'm glad my friends are, too. life is gentle. be careful.
Soup
10:25 PM:::
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