Life In The Fast Lane
It was a beautiful Friday afternoon. Sun shining, few clouds in the sky. A crisp 70 degrees. The perfect weather for a nice drive; and that’s exactly what I was doing. But then it all changed in an instant—when 70mph came to a screeching halt. What happened next was totally unexpected.
I’m on the road all the time. My commute to work every day is just over an hour round trip. I’ll admit I’m not a fan, but going to work pays the bills. Every time I get behind the wheel, I’m heading somewhere with a purpose. There is no lolli-gagging around. There is no sight seeing. I get in the car and go. I might drive a little faster than I should, but not excessive by any means.
I was roughly 25 minutes from home, with another 2 hours to go on my trip—heading to Knox Central High School for my team’s football game. Thankfully they left school a little earlier than expected and were ahead of me on the drive.
For a Friday afternoon, there was quite a bit of traffic on the interstate, but nothing out of the ordinary. We were mostly cruising at normal speeds. That was until the sudden brake lights, screeching tires, and multiple impacts.
At my first sight of brake lights, which came without warning, I slammed on my brakes—this was at roughly 70mph. Luckily for me, my Jeep could handle the sudden change of pace. The truck behind me—not so much. As soon as I hit my brakes, I immediately looked into my rearview mirror. I wanted to know what was going on behind me. What I saw wasn’t good! It was a red pickup truck, moments away from barreling into me.
At one point during that split second of ensuing terror, I gave this man the benefit of the doubt. I assumed he would veer off into the left median, to avoid a collision. But he didn’t. He hit me. Although the impact felt like he didn’t even tap his brakes, I find that hard to believe. I don’t think he saw my brake lights or maybe he did but wasn’t aware that it was a sudden stop and not just slowing down. His reaction time wasn’t what it needed to be for that situation, and trucks don’t stop on a dime. It was the hardest impact I’ve ever felt in my life. He hit me so hard that it forced my Jeep to crash into the stopped vehicle in front of me. And I didn’t just tap that car either. I sheered off the rear bumper on the passenger side. The impact then forced that car into the vehicle in front of him. Unreal.
I was thinking, “this isn’t happening. It’s just a nightmare.” “This can’t be real". Well, it was a nightmare, but a real one. It was very real. I sat there for a few moments, in utter shock and disbelief. The first thing I remember was my right leg. It did not feel right at all. My knee must have slammed into the dashboard, but I still didn’t register what had just happened. I didn’t know if I was injured. I wasn’t sure if I could move. It was like I was glued to the seat, but I wasn’t. I had my seatbelt on—but that’s it. I don’t think I blacked out but I was certainly in a state of shock. And as much as I hate to admit this, I will because I was not at fault in the accident—but I was on the phone with my mom as the collision happened.
After the second impact, which was immediate, and sitting there for a bit, I had remembered that I was on the phone. But my cellphone wasn’t in my hand anymore. Actually, it was nowhere to be found. Where the heck was it? The windows weren’t broken so it didn’t fly out. What felt like an eternity of searching for it was probably only a minute or two, if that. I finally found it, wedged under the gas pedal. Yes, that is correct! The impact was so great that it threw the phone from my hand. I imagine it probably slammed into the dashboard or windshield and then found its way under the pedal, but who really knows?
When I picked up the phone, I realized it was still connected. At the same time, two men approached my window and asked if I was ok. Holy shit! My mom just heard me get into a serious car accident. I got on and asked if she heard anything. She recalled hearing people talking but that’s it. Oh, thank goodness! I then briefly told her that I was in an accident and had to go. But she wasn’t just going to hang up and leave it at that. I’m pretty sure she asked me if I was ok and probably other things. My answer was likely something along the lines of, “Yeah, I think so”. But, I didn’t know if I was actually ok yet or not. I was still trying to process everything.
Then I remember moving my vehicle off the road and into the left median, as the two in front of me had already done so. I was glad to know the Jeep still had some life in it. The red truck—well, it was a good bit behind me, with a white Chevy tahoe smashed into and underneath the back of it. Airbags deployed. It was bad. Those vehicles were not moving from the left lane.
We all emerged from our vehicles, thankfully. There were 11 of us all together, 3 of which were very young children and two out-of-state travelers. Everyone seemed relatively unharmed but shocked to say the least. I kept apologizing to the guys in front of me. I said, “I was just hit so hard and I couldn’t avoid that impact”. They weren’t upset, but it didn’t stop me from feeling bad about it.
As we waited for the police to show up, I made all the phone calls I needed to—Nick. My football coach. My boss. And I called my poor mom back! I had never been in a serious accident before so I had no clue what to do. Nick instructed me to take pictures and get the necessary information for insurance purposes. I limped around and took pictures of what I thought was important to capture. At that time I began to realize that I was ok and hadn’t suffered any major injuries. But my adrenaline rush was pretty intense at that point too!
I called my coach and without any uncertainty said, “Hey coach, I just want to let you know I was in an accident and will probably be late to the game”. The thought of not continuing on wasn’t even an option. I was bound and determined to make that happen. (I arrived at 7:27pm for a 7:30pm start time).
After filing a police report and providing insurance information, I was permitted to leave the scene. I wasn’t quite ready to drive away like a boss, so I waited for Nick to come and swap out vehicles. Even though he was close, the traffic backup was unbelievable, so it took quite a while.
After transferring all my gear to the truck, I was ready to continue on, like nothing happened. Yeah, right! Who was I kidding? I was so stressed and nervous, but I convinced myself that I had to go. I couldn’t let my kiddos down. I needed to get behind the wheel and prove to myself that I was ok and I could do it. My tenacious self was not letting fear win! Not a chance in hell.
Nick was not okay with this. He didn’t want me to travel the 2 hours to my game and then another 2.5 hours back afterwards. He knew I was stressed. He could hear it in my voice and read it on my face. The tears didn’t help either. If I’m being honest, I wasn’t crazy about traveling that far to begin with, but COVID times call for COVID measures. I wasn’t about to take a seat on the bus from a kid that really needed it.
I finally got settled in the truck and ready to tackle the rest of the drive. I pulled up my directions and then called my mom back and explained everything. Yes, this call was made via bluetooth! She wasn’t crazy about me traveling to my game either, and wanted me to get checked out. But that wasn’t in the playbook so—not happening!
Onward I went. I hit shuffle all songs on my phone; all 2,400 of them. Never know what’s coming with that. To my surprise, the first song to play, was My Revival by Lauren Daigle. Oh, the tears. They poured down my cheeks as I listened to the lyrics. God was certainly watching over me! He has bigger plans for my life. I’m not done just yet!
“I will run and not grow weary
I will walk, I will not faint
I will soar on wings like eagles
Find my rest in your everlasting name
You are my revival
Jesus on you I wait
And I’ll lean on your promise
You will renew my strength”
To say this accident was terrifying would be a great understatement, but I can’t think of a more fitting word. As I look back on what transpired, I’m baffled. Why did this even happen? We just stopped all of a sudden. There was nothing alarming ahead. Did some jerk cut someone off and cause this ripple effect? I don’t know. The best analogy I can use to describe the accident is this—imagine traveling on the interstate and having a deer suddenly dart out in front of you. Completely unexpected. Minimal reaction time. That’s kind of what it felt like.
I ask myself so many questions—Even though I stopped, was I traveling too close to the car in front of me? If that car wasn’t there to take the impact, would it have been worse for me? I don’t know. I don’t have the answers. I have to let go of the what ifs though. Carrying that stress around in the future doesn’t change anything that happened in the past.
I remain thankful for the outcome. It could have been far worse. I expected it to be as I braced myself for the impact. My airbag didn’t deploy. That still shocks me. We think it was because my front contact wasn’t head on so it didn’t trigger the sensor. Still scary. As I write this a few days after the accident, I’m still sore. I’m sore all over. I’m sore in places that don’t even make sense. I have bruises in weird spots. Maybe I did miss some things in that split second.
Life in the fast lane is—well, fast. It all happened in an instant. It certainly puts things into perspective. I don’t take things for granted, that’s for sure. Every moment spent with loved ones is precious. Don’t waste them! I choose to find joy as often as I can. I aspire to be a kind human, all the time. I surround myself with people who inspire me, who are passionate, who are positive and exuberant.
We only get this one life. There are no do overs. The good news—we get to choose how we spend our time and energy! If you’re fortunate enough to walk away from a serious accident, don’t waste a moment of your life moving forward.