This is/was my car. I was driving it, with Elaine in the passenger seat and my kids in their child seats in the back.
EVERYONE’S OKAY – hardly a scratch on any of us. And no one else was involved, thankfully. On Monday, driving home from a really nice holiday weekend with Elaine’s family, I took a curve too fast on the Hutchinson River Parkway a few miles from the GW Bridge, lost control of the car on the wet road and slammed into the highway divider on our left. Both airbags deployed, there was a smell of burnt rubber coming into the car and a little bit of smoke, but no one seemed to be hurt. Adrian and Rachel were both crying, but it was probably because they’d been watching Elmo’s World on their headrest-mounted DVD screens and he went away so suddenly, without saying goodbye. In theory, the biggest fear in a highway accident like this after you come to a stop and you realize everyone’s ok is if someone barrels into you from behind, but in reality you don’t have a lot of time to panic about that because after like 2 seconds, you figure no one’s hit you YET so you’re probably ok. Fortunately that was the case.
In fact the lady in the car behind us stopped, got out to check on us, and stayed with us for 15 minutes while all the emergency crews were arriving. She even helped hold traffic in the lane next to us so I could run over and retrieve our front fender that had gone flying two lanes away and was cutting off traffic in that lane. Absolutely everybody, from the few civilians who stopped to make sure we were ok, to the cops, to the ambulance crew, to the tow truck guy, were all incredibly friendly and helpful, so I give big thanks to all you men and women out there in blue, red, and filthy overalls. You made a bad situation MUCH easier to get through.
As Elaine was expertly calming the kids down, and I was in between talking to the various people explaining what was going to happen, I realized that we had knocked down a pole that was now laying across two lanes of the highway going the OTHER direction, cutting off THOSE lanes. I don’t know how we managed not to cause a big disaster with all this debris flying in different directions, but thank God zero people were hurt. I WAS very self-conscious that they were talking about US on all the Ultra Doppler Copter Jam Cam traffic reports. “There’s a slowdown on the Hutch going BOTH ways because some idiot who hasn’t updated his comic strip in months drives too fast in the rain.”
I’d like to thank Elaine’s sister Amy and our friend Donna who came to support us at the hospital where we were taken just as a precaution, Amy’s husband Duy who left work early and was making calls for us, and especially Donna’s husband Marc who went more than 2 hours out of his way to actually drive us all home. THANKS.
I’m one of those people who gives thanks every day for his family and health. Every single day. So I don’t need something like this, or a holiday like Thanksgiving, to remind me how truly special my life is. But I admit it does make you appreciate everything just a little bit more when you put the two together.
Those of you that drive, DRIVE CAREFULLY. Now, take a moment to acknowledge that that phrase meant practically nothing to you, and think about it for real. DRIVE. CAREFULLY.
About aLp: It’s time for me to make a serious decision about the comic strip, if only for the short term. It’s painfully clear that I can’t make the comic unless I make myself make it, and that means sticking to some sort of schedule… but of course I’m afraid it’d take over my life like it did before. I kinda enjoyed having my life back this year, even though I know it made the site suck for most of it.
But there’s still such a huge amount of you still coming to the site after all this, and that makes me REALLY uncomfortable. Kinda like when I ask my kids, “WHO WANTS TO SING A SONG WITH DADDY?!” and they say, “ME ME ME!!”, and then like I can’t think of a song that’s not Twinkle Twinkle Little Star or the alphabet song. WHICH ARE THE SAME SONG, BTW.
So, when I finish and post the next comic, I’m gonna either announce I’m going back to some sort of regular schedule, or I’m going to give up the strip altogether and come at you with something else. Don’t stick a fork in me yet, however – stay tuned until I make that announcement.
Thanks, as always, for stopping by.
BAA BAA BLACK SHEEP IS ALSO THE SAME SONG.
