Slice of Life: Accident

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Yesterday my mom was in a car accident, not one that ended up causing much physical, bodily damage, but an accident none the less. It snowed in Ohio yesterday, the first real snow of winter. Half the state got a good amount of snow, the other half not much. 

I had no school due to the amount of snow in that county, and the fact that it hit at just the right time, when the buses would have been out. I got considerably less snow at my own house.

My mom, like myself, works a good way from where she lives. She was just about to work yesterday morning, on a straightaway, when the car coming towards her lost control, hit the brakes (which only makes things worse on slick roads), went into the ditch beside the road, corrected her mistake only to come back onto the road, cross the middle line, and smack into my mom's car. This sent my mom into the ditch, over the other side, and into the corn field. As the airbags went off, she saw the dim outline of something tall and thick in front of her and tried to swerve and miss whatever it was. After going several yards into the cornfield, she finally stopped. She had missed  the tall, thick telephone pole by 4 inches, probably saving her life, or at least avoiding major injuries. The police officers said that the other driver would have had to be going at least 15-25 miles faster than she should have in order to go so far and cause so much damage, while using her brakes, even with the added ice/snow. 

Both cars were totaled and are completely missing their front ends. My mom has a small abrasion on her left arm and the other driver went to the hospital with a knee injury, but is otherwise okay. They were very lucky.

My mom called me after she made it home, telling me what happened, but prefacing with, "There is no emergency, everything is fine, but..." As my mom told me about barely missing the telephone pole she said, "At one point I really thought, 'This is it.'" Even knowing she was okay, hearing this, knowing how close she was to major injuries or actually being killed, was hard. It reminds you how precious life is, how uncertain and unpredictable it is. 

For me, snow days mean staying home, catching up on things neglected, relaxing and enjoying the picturesque view out the window. But snow days, in all their beauty, are still dangerous. And this particular snow day was a reason to pause and appreciate all the little things I take for granted.