Just Drive ..... Nothing Else

    Last year, on October 29, 2012 I was involved in a wreck.  I had a lot of photos of my poor car saved on my laptop ~ the laptop that latter crashed.  Did I have photos saved anywhere else you say? NO, even though I have told everyone else to back up their photos because some day their computer will crash and they will lose those pictures.  Well, crum! Guess this will be a post without a photo. 
         On that evening I was minding my own business, driving home from my daughter's apartment.  We had spent the day together and had a good time.  I needed to get home before dark because my little schnauzer, Gracie, is afraid of the dark.   It was in the evening, around 7 pm, I'm guessing, and I was thinking about stopping at McDonalds and getting a hamburger and fries.  I had just seen a billboard for a Big Mac a couple of miles back. It looked good.  I was driving through a street light, a green street light, when out of no where came these headlights on my left.  The next thing I knew all I could see was white and my head hurt really bad.    
     An 18 year old girl was looking down at her GPS while driving really fast when she ran the red light.  She didn't see the light or me until she knew she was going to hit me.  As I approached the green light I could see down the block but I did not see her coming.  Did not see her car anywhere. The light was green before I approached it. I was probably going 30 mph because this is a downtown street. Thank goodness she told the police officers that she momentarily saw the red light only as she drove through it, she knew she ran a red light.  I don't think she even had a chance to try to brake. 
      I was ok.  My car was totaled. I had some broken bones in my dominant hand and wrist. Lots of bruises. A concussion. My spine rearranged.  Some problems from the concussion that took months and months to get over.  My brain did not appreciate being slammed first on one side of my skull and then the other side. I was alive so it was ok.  I didn't see the girl at the ER so I guess she was ok.  While the officers investigated I spoke with her out in the street.  She was really sorry.  I took her face in my hands and told her she was beautiful, and it was all going to be ok because those two piles of metal and fiberglass that use to be our cars --- they could be replaced but she couldn't...and that she didn't even have a scratch on that beautiful face.  Her momma would not have to get a terrible phone call.  It was all ok.  Her two passengers were ok.  Thank God for seatbelts and airbags.
     Just this summer, in the past few months, 3 people have died right there in separate wrecks.  It could have been me.  Now, I really notice how many car accidents occur in the town where I live. A horrible amount.  Just way too many.  Every time I hear a siren I think oh no, someone's life is going to change in an instant, maybe while they are driving fairly slow and thinking about having a hamburger for dinner.