Wednesday, August 10, 2011

We Interrupt This Day to Bring You--A Car Accident!

Last Wednesday was already shaping up to be a busy one. I had to get to the doctor's by nine in the morning (routine checkup), then over to Ryan's office to drop off the kids, then back to my office for a meeting with my boss and my boss's new boss, followed by a few hours of writing bio pages and editing photos. Oh and I needed to pack up the family and leave for a trip to San Diego. Phew!

As if that was not busy enough, at quarter to 9, I was sailing along when BOOM! Out of nowhere, I got hit from behind. By a teenager in a Jeep! So the funny thing was, you would think I would be grouchy and irritated that this happened.

The opposite! The first emotion I had was gratitude. Grateful we were all okay, glad the guy pulled over and did the honorable thing, admitted responsibility and apologized. Grateful he had good insurance and that this would all be taken care of.
Second emotion was empathy for the other driver. He was a teenager going through his first car accident, an unavoidable rite of passage here in LALALand. He was worried about the effect that the accident would have on his insurance rates and more importantly on his dad. I agreed to wait a day to report it so he could have time to break the news to his dad himself without it being via a phone call from the insurance adjuster.

I called the doctor's office and rescheduled for an hour later, then relaxed somewhat. It was like someone had given me permission to derail the overscheduled morning so I could take a deep breath and focus.  Instead of leaving in the afternoon, I put off travelling to San Diego until the next day.  I can't open the bashed-in back door of the car to get out William's stroller, but we have another stroller in the garage, so no big deal.  Insurance has been notified.  The proper people will do their job and things will be settled, and for some odd reason, I'm at peace with it.

Well, I won't say I was completely at peace. When I got to the doctor's office, I had high blood pressure...120 over some alarming number.

Oh and P.S. I woke up the next morning feeling fine, no whiplash or anything to report!

1 comment:

Sarah Auerswald said...

Oh no! So sorry you were in a car accident! And so glad you were OK!

Great seeing you in San Diego - and looking forward to more!