What a Day
I'm going to apologize right now if this rambles, doesn't make sense, or gets excessively emotional and/or cheesy for anyone. I don't enjoy turning people off of my writing, but today seems a day for reflection, appreciation, and spewing of pure raw emotions.
This morning, at approximately 9:45 AM, I was riding my bike to class as I do every day I don't wake up too late or too groggy from the night before. I took my usual route (Carpenter to 16th to Morgan up to UIC) and lectured myself for not riding more after getting winded way too early. At Roosevelt I stopped for the red light alongside a UIC cop. When I saw the east/westbound light go from green to yellow and saw a car slow down in the northern eastbound lane, I pushed myself into the intersection as I've done plenty of times before. The pedestrian across the street yelling "Watch out!" and the squeal of brakes barely registered before I felt the first of the three impacts (the second being me slamming down upon a windshield and the third being me hitting the pavement). The way it was described to my father by the cop who had witnessed the entire thing made me think of a movie. The only difference being that people who get hit like that in the movies don't usually tend to get up again.
Now, I'm not going to be all melodramatic and tell the tale of my near-death experience. As far as I'm concerned it never was a near-death experience because I knew from the second I hit the pavement that I was going to be ok. Sure, my left leg hurt like a bitch and I was bleeding profusely from my forehead, but I still knew I was going to be ok. I could feel all four of my limbs, I was fully conscious, etc. etc. But to continuously hear "I'm glad to see you're doing so well considering the damage to the windshield" throughout the day can certainly get a person thinking. It could have been a lot worse. For all intents and purposes, it should have been a lot worse. But it wasn't. And while sitting in Cook County's trauma center I cried as I finally admitted to myself something I had been trying to deny (or at least seriously question) since I was in high school: the existence of some higher power. And it kind of depresses me that it took something as large as this to finally convince me that there are protectors out there, but when I keep thinking about that 5 fucking seconds and how I'm fine and how I could have not been, I just start to cry.
Melanie told me that she was amazed at how modest I was being over it. Truth is, I don't think it really started to sink in until I was on my way home. Until then I was my usually cocky, "look how bad-ass I am I was just hit by a car" self. Since then I've been nothing but a bundle of nerves who will occasionally start crying whenever I think of how lucky I am (and it's been happening a lot). And while I originally thought this was going to be much, much longer the computer is heavy and hot and my ass is going numb for the 40th time today. So in short, thank you to what/whoever was watching out for me today. Thank you to my family and my amazing girlfriend for being there immediately. Thank you to the friends and family who called, visited, brought crutches, offered their first floor apartments to me, and didn't recoil from my uglified face. I love you all, in addition to many more.
And you didn't think I'd leave y'all without a pic, did you?
This morning, at approximately 9:45 AM, I was riding my bike to class as I do every day I don't wake up too late or too groggy from the night before. I took my usual route (Carpenter to 16th to Morgan up to UIC) and lectured myself for not riding more after getting winded way too early. At Roosevelt I stopped for the red light alongside a UIC cop. When I saw the east/westbound light go from green to yellow and saw a car slow down in the northern eastbound lane, I pushed myself into the intersection as I've done plenty of times before. The pedestrian across the street yelling "Watch out!" and the squeal of brakes barely registered before I felt the first of the three impacts (the second being me slamming down upon a windshield and the third being me hitting the pavement). The way it was described to my father by the cop who had witnessed the entire thing made me think of a movie. The only difference being that people who get hit like that in the movies don't usually tend to get up again.
Now, I'm not going to be all melodramatic and tell the tale of my near-death experience. As far as I'm concerned it never was a near-death experience because I knew from the second I hit the pavement that I was going to be ok. Sure, my left leg hurt like a bitch and I was bleeding profusely from my forehead, but I still knew I was going to be ok. I could feel all four of my limbs, I was fully conscious, etc. etc. But to continuously hear "I'm glad to see you're doing so well considering the damage to the windshield" throughout the day can certainly get a person thinking. It could have been a lot worse. For all intents and purposes, it should have been a lot worse. But it wasn't. And while sitting in Cook County's trauma center I cried as I finally admitted to myself something I had been trying to deny (or at least seriously question) since I was in high school: the existence of some higher power. And it kind of depresses me that it took something as large as this to finally convince me that there are protectors out there, but when I keep thinking about that 5 fucking seconds and how I'm fine and how I could have not been, I just start to cry.
Melanie told me that she was amazed at how modest I was being over it. Truth is, I don't think it really started to sink in until I was on my way home. Until then I was my usually cocky, "look how bad-ass I am I was just hit by a car" self. Since then I've been nothing but a bundle of nerves who will occasionally start crying whenever I think of how lucky I am (and it's been happening a lot). And while I originally thought this was going to be much, much longer the computer is heavy and hot and my ass is going numb for the 40th time today. So in short, thank you to what/whoever was watching out for me today. Thank you to my family and my amazing girlfriend for being there immediately. Thank you to the friends and family who called, visited, brought crutches, offered their first floor apartments to me, and didn't recoil from my uglified face. I love you all, in addition to many more.
And you didn't think I'd leave y'all without a pic, did you?