My Former Car
Do you believe in miracles? Perhaps I can change your mind. While driving down the interstate just before Christmas, 2001, I made the terrible mistake of looking down at just the wrong moment. Don't get me wrong. It was just a second or two--long enough for someone to change a radio station, fix the heater, or quiet a noisy child. However, those seconds changed my life. When I looked up, a tractor trailer had merged onto the interstate just in front of me. I realized that he was not picking up enough speed for me to stop before I hit him, so I swerved to get out of the way. In the process, I lost control of the car, hit one of the truck's side tires, and flipped about three or four times (according to the witnesses, anyway, I don't really remember that part of it very clearly).
So, what was the miracle? Me. Despite the violent nature of the accident, my only "injuries" were two small nicks (together, smaller than the size of a dime), and an abrasion on my left shoulder blade. Why is that necessarily miraculous? Here are a few reasons:
The tractor trailer was a tanker carrying motor oil. It only blew a tire.
In the flipping, everything in my center console flew out of the car as well as several CD's that were sitting in the passenger seat. None of it hit me.
Of the seven windows in the car, five of them shattered and four of them were completely missing when the dust settled, and I was hardly cut at all.
In swerving to miss the tanker, I didn't think to check to see if the other lane was empty, and during Friday afternoon traffic, no other automobiles were involved.
Both airbags went off, but I hit neither of them, and neither of them burned me in any way. In fact, my glasses were still on my face when I exited the car. (By the way, the pair of glasses I had on that day are very easily bent out of shape. Even if I had hit the airbag and simply forgotten it, they would have shown some sign of it.)
The car landed on its wheels, and I was able to get out of the car and walk around without any assistance.
When the paramedics arrived, they were shocked to find my pulse at a normal rate. Thinking back, I remember feeling very little anxiety throughout the duration of the accident. I had enough presence of mind to remember both my home phone number and my parents' cell phone number that I rarely ever call.
The front grill was badly crushed, and yet my legs were fine. Despite the fact that the car rolled, nothing caved into the cabin.
The back wheel completely came off, but did not hit even one other car on the busy interstate behind me.
When I first started my drive, I considered opening the sunroof. Of course, it was a rather chilly day, so I thought about leaving the glass closed, but opening the inner cover to let in a bit more sunlight. Having never done this before, I pulled back the cover to realize that this would make the cabin unbearably hot. In other words, I was one thought away from rolling a car with a partially open sunroof.
I had cleaned out my car, the previous day--and my car was notoriously messy--for no real reason at all. It was the first time I had done anything like that in about four months or so. Had it not been clean, there would have been quite a bit of trash, clothing, hangers, and other stuff (like a 5' long wooden staff that I used in a Christmas play) to be batted about the cabin.
While I am now a big fan of Toyota Solaras, seat belts, and even airbags, I am an even bigger fan of God. He gave me a mother who stressed the importance of seat belts and a father with the foresight to purchase a safe automobile. More importantly, He sat beside me, kept me calm, and held me in my seat as everything went crazy around me. Some may say that everything was purely coincidental, but they probably also believe that you can put several pieces of metal in a blender and (after four or five billion years) eventually end up with a watch.
Speaking of metal in a blender, have you ever wondered what your car would look like if it flipped three or four times while traveling at 70 mph? Here's what you might end up with if you start with a 1999 Toyota Solara.
