(no subject)
So, in my apparently endless quest to explore all that various depths of terror a human being can experience - today, I made a sincere effort to have a major car accident.
On the way to work, there is a junction where I have to join the dual carriageway. It takes the form of a steep hill leading to a sharp 90 degree bend onto the A41 with no slip road/ filter lane to speak of to pick up speed in. It's something of an accident hot spot, to say the least. I've done it every day since starting work and had no problems with it.
Today, as I was approaching it, I reflected on how dangerous a junction it was. This, apparently, was enough of a distraction that I failed to slow down sufficiently (added excuses of it being wet and there being loose gravel on the road, which exacerbated the situation, but the crux of the matter was that I was too fast). Regardless, as I emerged onto the carriageway, the steering went suddenly very light, and the car started to skid. Being an inexperienced driver, I did what came naturally - hit the breaks and tried to steer the car back to the right course. Oops. Naturally, this caused the car to go into a spin instead over which I had no control whatsoever, sending me through both lanes and careering towards the verge. I could just sit back and observe as the car bought me round to facing directly into the vehicle bearing down on me. Surprisingly clear revelations to my adrenaline saturated (yet strangely passive and accepting of my fate, in stark contrast to the animal panic and flight reaction of the previous intense terror experience involving a horse, a river and Russia) mind: it's actually very quiet in a spinning car, meaning that I now have the song that was playing (Decades V.2. by Assemblage 23) stuck in my head; that this was possibly going to end up very expensive; that I hoped I span a bit more before the next car hit me so that at least it caught the passenger side and not the driver's side where I was seated; that I was going to have issues getting to work if I wrote off the car; that I hoped not many vehicles got caught up in what was about to happen.
As has been established on numerous occasions in the past, I am sickeningly, incomprehensibly, unreasonably lucky. All of the traffic managed to stop with absolutely no collisions with me or between themselves. After gliding through over 180 degrees and skimming the entire carriageway, my car came to a natural stop before encountering the center barrier; when we went past again later, there weren't even tyre marks in the central reservation.
I believe my response at this point was pretty reasonable, in that I hit the hazard lights and started crying. One of the nearby cars had two guys in it, so one hopped out to drive me and my car a bit further up the road and into the services to recover. I called my dad, who came out to check that I was ok; while I had no physical injuries due to somehow avoiding hitting anyone or anything, to say that I was shaken up was probably understating it. I decided that I was not going to make it the rest of the way to work, so when I had pulled myself together sufficiently (which I will admit took a couple of hours), I drove home.
On the way to work, there is a junction where I have to join the dual carriageway. It takes the form of a steep hill leading to a sharp 90 degree bend onto the A41 with no slip road/ filter lane to speak of to pick up speed in. It's something of an accident hot spot, to say the least. I've done it every day since starting work and had no problems with it.
Today, as I was approaching it, I reflected on how dangerous a junction it was. This, apparently, was enough of a distraction that I failed to slow down sufficiently (added excuses of it being wet and there being loose gravel on the road, which exacerbated the situation, but the crux of the matter was that I was too fast). Regardless, as I emerged onto the carriageway, the steering went suddenly very light, and the car started to skid. Being an inexperienced driver, I did what came naturally - hit the breaks and tried to steer the car back to the right course. Oops. Naturally, this caused the car to go into a spin instead over which I had no control whatsoever, sending me through both lanes and careering towards the verge. I could just sit back and observe as the car bought me round to facing directly into the vehicle bearing down on me. Surprisingly clear revelations to my adrenaline saturated (yet strangely passive and accepting of my fate, in stark contrast to the animal panic and flight reaction of the previous intense terror experience involving a horse, a river and Russia) mind: it's actually very quiet in a spinning car, meaning that I now have the song that was playing (Decades V.2. by Assemblage 23) stuck in my head; that this was possibly going to end up very expensive; that I hoped I span a bit more before the next car hit me so that at least it caught the passenger side and not the driver's side where I was seated; that I was going to have issues getting to work if I wrote off the car; that I hoped not many vehicles got caught up in what was about to happen.
As has been established on numerous occasions in the past, I am sickeningly, incomprehensibly, unreasonably lucky. All of the traffic managed to stop with absolutely no collisions with me or between themselves. After gliding through over 180 degrees and skimming the entire carriageway, my car came to a natural stop before encountering the center barrier; when we went past again later, there weren't even tyre marks in the central reservation.
I believe my response at this point was pretty reasonable, in that I hit the hazard lights and started crying. One of the nearby cars had two guys in it, so one hopped out to drive me and my car a bit further up the road and into the services to recover. I called my dad, who came out to check that I was ok; while I had no physical injuries due to somehow avoiding hitting anyone or anything, to say that I was shaken up was probably understating it. I decided that I was not going to make it the rest of the way to work, so when I had pulled myself together sufficiently (which I will admit took a couple of hours), I drove home.