Terrible Analogies

While driving home this afternoon I witnessed a car accident on the freeway.  I was traveling 70mph in the number two lane.  A white BMW passed me going roughly 75 and was now about 30 feet in front of me in the fast (left hand) lane.  Ahead of us was an ocean of red brake lights.  Seeing this, everyone began to put on their brakes, slowing down to 55.  From my left a white Pontiac Grand Prix screamed past easily doing 90mph+, and slammed right into the rear end of the BMW like a computer-guided three ton sidewinder missile.  I didn’t see any hint of this Pontiac slowing down, nor hear any squeal from its tires.

It’s amazing what a car crash sounds like up close.  It’s difficult to appreciate the subtle nuances of the entire violent act without intimate firsthand experience.  The ugly crunch of metal, the spray of glass, the slowing down of time…it’s almost surrealistic, like you’re watching a movie; it seems strangely removed and far too real to be real.

I’m no stranger to shocking misfortunes.  I myself have been in a horrible car crash, and nearly lost my life rock climbing in Joshua Tree during a winter snowstorm, but these are distant memories.  I’d forgotten how the mind processes traumatic events.

The front of the Pontiac was crushed like a dirty pair of jeans balled up on the bathroom floor, paint flaked off the hood in large sheets exposing the dull metal beneath, and the front tires were splayed out like a tawdry centerfold pose.  The front windshield looked like somebody took an angry baseball bat to it.  I could see a smooth splash of blood on the opposite side of the glass.  From the impact, the BMW was thrust straight forward about 200 feet, but surprisingly it didn’t suffer nearly the amount of damage that the Pontiac has sustained.  The back bumper was pushed into the trunk, and something was leaking out from underneath, leaving behind a jagged liquid trail on the grooved pavement.

If I had left work a minute sooner (or later), and had chosen the fast lane instead of the number two lane, that BMW could have been me.  It’s crazy how fate/destiny/luck works.  With so many possible “what ifs”, one could go loopy thinking about such things.