Things I Don't Get.

My Freaking Life (Pt.1)

My freaking life.

So.. Friday (Jan. 31) there was this really bad snow storm and, since I’m in college now, I had to drive to classes.

That’s cool.. Snow isn’t coming down that hard. But I live in this town in Illinois called Hamilton, it’s right on the river. Across the bridge from Hamilton is Keokuk.

Gas is cheaper in Keokuk, so I drove across the bridge to get some gas before going to classes. This is just fine and dandy, maybe just a little chilly.

So I’m on my way to classes after getting gas. As soon as I’m off the bridge, what happens?

Of course. I start sliding. Like really bad. I’m sliding for twenty, thirty feet. I take my foot off the gas, that does nothing. I turn into the swerves, once again.. it does nothing. I’m starting get a little scared so I tap on the brake.

I know you aren’t supposed to hit the breaks when this happens, but light taps doesn’t really hurt. The tap does nothing. Now I’m beginning to spin. Of course. Of freaking course!!! I spin a couple times before slamming right into a guardrail that is seriously not even two feet away from train tracks.

The guardrail tears off my drivers side bumper and slams into the passenger side of the car, causing the passenger side air bag to deploy. Well that’s fun.

The force of the impact between my car and the guard rail sends my car flying over the tracks and it stops just on the other side of them. This is when I stopped and everything that just happened hit me.

I just wrecked my freaking car.

This lady pops up at my window out of nowhere and she knocks on my window. I park my car and shut it off, opening the door as she asks me if I’m alright.

I say yeah, just scared. Then she  informs me that someone is already calling the cops. This is when I pull out my phone to call my dad. He doesn’t answer and by the time I hang up the call, the cops have arrived and so has a paramedic dude. The dude takes my pulse and him and the cop ask if I’m okay or hurt or cold. I tell them I’m fine, just freaked out, and not cold at all.

The cop has me sit in his truck so I can stay warm and I call my mom. She gets worried and I start crying. Nice to see the shock has worn off.. I’m crying in public.. No shame.

Mom is thinking that the wreck isn’t as bad as I’m making it sound. The entirety of my phone call, I’m staring at my headlight that’s laying on the side of the road. I guess I made the wreck an understatement on the phone.

When we finally get off the phone, I call my dad. This time he answers. I tell him what happened and he thinks the same thing as Mom: I’m making it sound worse than it is. He asks if the car is driveable and you know what I tell him?

"I don’t know.. I’m too scared to look." Now I’m watching the cops pick up pieces of my car and place them inside the vehicle. Dad tells me he’ll be there soon.

He finally gets to the scene, looks at my car, comes to me, sort of laughs and shakes his head, saying, “If you’re gonna do it, do it right.”

I’m still kind of crying, “Did I do it right?”

A little pause, “You did it right, baby doll.”

Later on he tells me that I wrecked my car better than he’s ever wrecked a vehicle. He’s never gotten an air bag to deploy.

And now I’m extremely jumpy, my nerves are shot, I think I’m  little anxious, and I’m terrified of driving in snow.

How fun is that?

I get to look for  new car now.. I should be getting a rental car soon, too.

Whatever.

As much as I complained about hating that car, I do love it’s stereo and, in the end, she did a good job of protecting me. I’m uninjured and, surprisingly, extremely lucky. A lot of things could have happened that made my wreck worse. I could have lost my life, at least three different ways, but I came out unscathed. Now I’m sad that I don’t have that car anymore.. I owe it my life.. Food for thought.

There are definitely going to be more parts of me complaining about my life or, even, myself. So.. Just throwing that out there. Be prepared..