Way Back Wednesday I: The Wreck

As I pledged last week, I am going to start trying to devote Wednesday posts to highlighting significant and/or memorable things from my life before I blogged daily. I anticipate this walk down memory lane will be somewhat random. Without further adieu, my first installation.

December 23, 1987
(Was it 21 years ago, really? Wow!)
My sister, Amanda, and I were traveling from our home in Phenix City, Alabama with my Aunt Laurie and cousin Leigh to meet my Aunt Leslie at a Christmas Carousel near her home in Lanett, AL. The drive is only about 40 minutes, but was almost completely dark, country two-lane roads.

As we were leaving my mother commanded us to wear our seatbelts. This seems insignificant now, but remember in the 80's seatbelts were not yet state law. As a matter of fact, my mother's insistence was largely because of the mid-80s campaigning for widespread voluntary seatbelt use by Barbara Mandrell after she suffered near-fatal accident.

At approximately 7pm, as we were approaching the top of a hill on a very dark country road we saw the headlights of another vehicle coming up over the hill--and they appeared to be squarely in our lane. My aunt was driving. I was in the front passenger seat. I can still remember what those ominous lights looked like--the uncertainty of whether or not they were actually in our lane---how it really did happen in snapshots of slow motion.

There was no screaming. My Aunt Laurie swerved toward the left. The lights-that-seemed-intent-on-hitting-us followed. As she snatched the wheel back towards the right side of the road the impact happened. Head-on. Both vehicles were estimated to be travelling about 60 mph.

Our seatbelts, the front-end collision firewall in my aunt's car (a feature only found in two types of cars at that time) and the providence of God saved our lives. The immediate aftermath of the collision involved scrambling to vacate the car before anyone else crested the hill and unknowingly slammed into us. I remember being deathly afraid the car was going to explode. (I was 13 and had seen too many action movies.)

Over the course of the next several minutes strangers stopped and rendered aid while we waited for an ambulance to arrive. We were all laying in various places along a grass embankment with no idea of the conditions of the other members of our family...and still no idea who had been in that other car and whether they had survived.

Although I wound up being among the least injured, I had muffled chest sounds at the scene which led to fears that I might have a rib injury that punctured a lung. I, therefore, wound up on the first ambulance with the man who had hit us. We were both on backboards, with C-collars on our necks, and a handful of EMTs hovering. I will never forget seeing the grandfatherly, uniformed state trooper lean into the back of the ambulance and pronounce, "Mr. Ronald Lee P., you have the right to remain silent..." I remember the gravity of the situation starting to settle in at that point and the tears began to flow. They were hot, angry tears...an overflow of fear and disbelief. There was a uniformed woman holding my hand, attempting to shield me from what was going on with the drunk, extremely belligerent man who has hit us.

We would later learn that Ronnie was an admitted alcoholic, with previous DUIs, who had a 3.7 blood alcohol content and a fifth of Jim Beam between his legs at the scene of the accident. He had two dozen broken bones and spent several months in the hospital.

I do not remember much more about the experience except for the moment my mom and dad arrived. They had received a phone call telling them we had been in an accident and our conditions were unknown. They drove the 35 miles to East Alabama Medical Center in Opelika, Alabama in silence.

Amanda and I were placed in the same holding room after our evaluations. When my mother came running frantically around the corner she saw her two daughters lying side by side on gurneys, still immobilized with backboards and C-collars and IVs. Yet, I could sense her immediate relief. We were clearly a sight for sore eyes. (As I reconsider this experience from the perspective of a mother, it takes on even more meaning.)

My aunt and 2 year old cousin were stitched up and sent home to recover. I spent one night for observation. My little sister spent 3-4 additional days as she recovered from a broken ankle and collarbone.

I had nightmares for months that the driver came back to finish the job. I know it is not rational, just the manifestation of my fears. In the Spring of 1988 I was summoned to testify before a grand jury. The state of Alabama automatically pressed charges against the driver because of his high blood alcohol content.

I was so young, I really just wanted to move on, so I am not certain what wound up happening to Mr. P. As I was writing this tonight I did a google search to see if I could find any information on him, but yielded nothing.

This experience obviously effected me in many ways, but I think the most lasting impact was on my relationship with my sister. We were 13 and 10 and had historically had a fairly rocky relationship. Those moments on the side of the road, the hours in the trauma bay of the Emergency Room, coming that close to losing each other--it was remarkable perspective to be given at our ages. We still had our sibling issues as we went through adolescence together...but I think we always have December 23rd somewhere in the back of our minds.