I'm driving along Guess Road outside of Durham, North Carolina in my secondhand Pinto mini-wagon, late at night, winter of early 1980 (I'm nineteen at the time); it's hilly curvy country and the road all the way is a two-laner. A tape of Marianne Faithfull's Broken English is playing and a Ravi Shankar record lent by a friend at Duke is occupying the passenger seat. As I begin rounding a sharp curve, BOOM!
Within underwater seconds -- exactly like some slow motion scene from a movie --I'm hanging upside down by my seatbelt! BOOM! Ridiculously, Marianne Faithfull continues singing Broken English at medium loud volume. I look down and see the Ravi Shankar record in a pool of ditchwater, crumpled just like the roof on the passenger side. Good thing there's not a real passenger. The engine is still running.
OK, now what? First thing I do is flip the off button on the cassette player. Then I turn the engine off. Next, I unsnap the seatbelt and clamber down to the ceiling and out the door, scraping it open. A miracle, I think, checking myself for damages (there are none). The Pinto is totalled -- smashed into a ditch, having slid on black ice, hit an earthen embankment, flipped and spun completely around, having then stopped, facing back toward town.
The air feels about in the twenties, so I wrap my coat around a bit and look for house lights nearby. I needn't worry, because within minutes an EMT van comes around the bend, sees the wreck and stops to help. A state trooper arrives about fifteen minutes later. They look around and find areas of black ice streaming down a driveway a ways back, ascertain what happened, and let me go on my merry way.
Actually, the EMT guys give me a ride and I get a remarkably good night of sleep before having to deal with the car, a tow truck, insurance, and all that jazz.
Ever since, I often think of my incredible good fortune having survived without a single scratch; the lurking dangers of icy surfaces; Marianne Faithfull (I later met her ex-husband John Dunbar and son Nick, staying for several weeks at the flat where said son had been raised in London after Marianne hooked up wth Mick Jagger); Ravi Shankar; and simple twists of fate. And let's not forget that Dave Edmunds & Rockpile song, "Crawling from the Wreckage," which seemed fitting at the time and has ever since.
Today's Rune: Breakthrough. Above: AC/DC Black Ice album cover from 2008.
5 comments:
Wow, good thing you came out of that alright, I would have been simply freaking out and no more good.
Hey, there are many people go through accidents, but not many walk away without a bruise. I talked about my second one, first time I was totaled on the busy intersection. My car was smashed, starting from the engine, all inside and trunk. one thing remained untouched, my seat. And i lived a few more, not related to the car, but to the gun and knife. but anyway, after a few of them you realize that luck could happened only one time and again if you are lucky. There something else, and i still try to figure it out. And by the way, the first time is the scariest one, and following ones is like "ok, and what this is about now?"
I'm glad you got through safely. In such things you have no time for fear until afterward. Broken English is a helluva rockin tune by the way.
Been there done that more than once my friend. And that is enough talk of wrecks either rolling or walking.
Great information, many of us meet with accidents, getting insured is wonderful thing.
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