A Close Call By Minda Zetlin
"Jesus!
Where did it happen?"
"Out
on the turnpike. Couple
of weeks ago. I went
right perpendicular into the truck."
"Whose
fault?"
"What
do you think? I was
passing him in the left lane, and he didn't see me coming, so he
shifted lanes right into me. Just
crumpled that little car like styrofoam."
"Wow.
Close call, huh?"
"Uh-huh.
I thought I was checking out for sure."
"So
what did you think about? Did
you think about your wife?"
"Nope.
Wasn't time. And my life didn't flash before my eyes or any thing like
that. First thing I
thought was that I was going to have a quick and easy trip out of
here. Thought, first thing I'd feel would be the heat of the truck.
And then it would be all over before I knew it."
"Wow.
And then you weren't even hurt."
"I
was real lucky. I mean
nothing happened to me, nothing.
And you should have seen the car!"
"Totaled?"
"I
mean, totally totaled. See,
what you have to understand is that the wheels on the truck come up
to the window. So, I
was, like, sliding under the truck."
"Yeah,
I hear people get their faces taken off that way."
"I
believe it. Anyway, I
was sliding under there, and the wheels came into the car.
The glove compartment just popped right out onto the seat.
And I kept thinking, 'Now I'm gonna die.' 'OK, I'm gonna die
now' 'No? OK, now
I'm gonna die.' Then, finally, the car stopped moving and I thought,
O.K., now it's going to burst into flames.
But it didn't. So
I finally just opened the door open and went running over to the
median. And there I
was. It was incredible.
These people came up to me and like, they kept looking at the
car and then looking at me and then they would touch me to see if I
was really there."
"Bet
that truck driver was relieved."
"Oh
man. He was pale as a
ghost. He looked worse
than I did."
"Well,
of course. That
idiot."
"It
was unreal. I was
standing there and I looked down and there was sort of a little
grain of something on my finger.
And what it was was a tiny piece of glass from the
windshield, you know? So
I went to brush it off and I got the tiniest little cut.
There was like one drop of blood.
And I went, 'Aw shucks!' because, up to that point I'd come
out without a scratch. Literally,
without a scratch."
"Oh,
too bad."
"Yeah,
so at first I was just numb, you know?
Like, the police came and asked me if I was O.K. and I said
yeah, except that I was late for work.
So they drove me in.
"Well,
of course by that time I really was pretty late and I thought the
boss might get real aggravated or something because he's real touchy
about that kind of thing, you know?
So anyway, I explained what happened and he said it was fine,
and he was glad I wasn't hurt and then I went and sat at my desk and
started looking at some reports, and suddenly I started bawling.
It was embarrassing as hell, but I couldn't stop.
"Cause,
I realized, I came so close. That
could've been it, you know, my whole life.
I'd never get rich and famous, never retire to the Bahamas,
never even make VP, right? All
over. I mean I was
blubbering like a little kid."
"Sounds
heavy."
"Yeah.
So, anyway, after that, for about the next three days I was
really floating. Just
completely out of touch with the world.
You know, there's nothing like having almost bought it to
make you feel loose and easy and disconnected from everything."
"Yeah,
you look more spiritual or something."
"All
those stupid little aggravations that usually bug you, just can't
touch you for a while. It's
great. Too bad it has
to wear off."
"So
what did your wife say about all this?
Was she relieved, or pissed about the car?"
"Oh,
she was relieved. She
said, 'God must have wanted you to live.'
'The hell with that,' I said.
'If God wanted me to live, He could have done it a lot
simpler by just leaving me alone.
He could have skipped the whole thing.'
"'No',
I said, 'clearly, God wanted the Toyota to die. That must have been his purpose.
He just wanted to wipe that Toyota off the face of the
earth.' And you know, God's got a point, because five days later we
got this check from the insurance company, and then we bought this
Nissan, which actually runs a lot better.
So He must have looked down and figured it was time for me to
have a hatchback. And boy, when God makes a decision, you'd just better not get
in His way..."
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