It's 24 years today -- and yes yes, I know what the date is; how apt -- since I rolled and wrecked a brand-new car with my father in the passenger seat at the 110k speed limit just west of Bordertown, on a sinister traffic-eating stretch of the Duke's Highway, notorious for the number of single-vehicle accidents there, and came within millimetres of breaking my neck. Where other people have a smoothly curved cervical spine, I have an S-bend at C4 and C5.
How we both walked away without needing any first aid or going into shock I really do not know, but it's those sorts of times that prompt me to make a sacrifical offering of some kind to the tough-as-nails pioneering ancestors.
Now excuse me while I go and re-heat this wheat bag and take some Nurofen Plus.
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7 comments:
My father did the very same thing once (not on quite as impressive a date as you though) - completely wrote off a car and walked away with no first aid.
I'm glad we still have you here. Not as glad as you are, I'm sure, but glad nonetheless. Anniversaries like that are chilling.
So glad you and your dad are around to celebrate the anniversary, even if it is with a nurofen and wheatbag.
Wheat bag, Kerry? Have you tried a hot water bottle? Or two?
After trying to get my wheat bag REALLY hot, (because it cools off so quickly) in the microwave, it burst into flames.
A hot water bottle, otoh, warms and warms and warms and ...doesn't burst into flames, and is still warm the next morning.
A hot water bottle compared to a wheat bag is like your grandma compared to eddie maguire.
But I wouldn't want to try to wrap any of those around my neck.
Stories like this terrify me. Not for the joy of survival but for the possibilities of death.
So far I have guided three daughters through the process of getting their drivers licence. Only one more to go.
I consider it one of the most difficult tasks of parenthood to get your children through the requisite kilometers that need to be clocked up before they can go for their license.
Hours and hours of anxiety to endure and then finally when they get their license hours more, worse hours when they are away from you - novice drivers in a world full of potential hazards such as you illustrate here.
Twenty four years ago, were you a learner driver, a mere novice at the wheel?
Thank goodness you both survived, otherwise as elsewhere observed we would not be able to enjoy your wonderful blog.
Elisabeth -- yes, I'd only had my licence for just over a year and was just off P plates (I learned to drive very late, after a traumatic experience with a sadistic pig of a schoolgirl-fancying driving teacher when I was 16), I was in an unfamiliar car, there were tricky road conditions, etc etc.
Don't panic on your kids' account; most people are better drivers at the age of five than I was for the first year or two I had my licence -- but I've only been in one other accident since, not serious and it was 100% the other person's fault. So even the incompetent can step up.
Yes, that was chilling. Glad you're here, Pav. Well there, but you know what I mean.
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