On My Near Death Experience and How I Plan to Exploit It For the Next 6 Months to Gain Sympathy

While my life is no longer entrenched in religious ideology as it once was (my father was a minister for 7 years…is it any shock I turned out the way I did?) there are still moments when I am completely and thoroughly convinced of the existence of a higher power.

My guardian angel if you will.

Since I’m Tarantino-ing this shit and I already told you the end of the story (I almost died) let’s now rewind to the beginning.

So the big moving day comes. The movers (one of whom reeked of alcohol and then proceeded to “use our bathroom facilities” for an excess of 15 minutes to void god knows what out of her system) took their sweet ass time getting to the house, loading it all up, and basically doing their job. Needless to say the extended wait time prior to the drive made me all the more anxious and ready to get it over with.

The Boo and I had decided we would only drive 1/3 of the way that day, stopping in Jacksonville to rest at a hotel and meet my family for Mexican food and margaritas. (Plenty of motivation for me!) We get on the road with our cars stuffed to the brim and I prayed to God my little car would make it. (It’s been a bit temperamental in the past and seeing as my luck is how it is, I had a feeling the trip wouldn’t go entirely smoothly.)

About an hour into the trip I called the Boo. Riding along behind him the whole way, I informed him that my car was doing a “driving-over-a-bridge-shaky-type thing”. He checked my car and tires from his rear view mirror and all seemed normal. Sweaty palmed and increasingly panicked I braved ahead.

30 minutes later I called him again.

Me: (borderline hysterical) “Babe, something is really wrong. I’m shaking again and it’s getting worse. I think I can feel my cheeks moving like when you’re on a roller coaster or something”

Boo: (annoyed as this is probably the 18^th phone call in 3 hours) “We’re almost there, sucker. Just ride it out for 20 more miles and we’ll be at the hotel and I can look at your car.”

Me: (close to tears) “Just get me to the fucking hotel!” CLICK

Fast forward to 5 minutes later…

I’m clocking 75 on the speedometer. My cheeks resemble that of a sky-diver, my heart is gripped in panic and the Boo is now a good ½ mile ahead of me.

Suddenly I feel my car shake uncontrollably, followed by a phulump, phulump, phulump-ing sound. My car fishtails off the road just feet past two massive barriers holding up the overpass.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck” is the only thing I seem to be able to utter as I careen my out of control car into a grassy median in the middle of a construction site off the highway.

I open my door, tears streaming down my face and what do I find??? THIS.

I called the Boo in complete and utter hysterics (almost to the point of unintelligibility) and tried to explain what happened. I saw the wires , smelled a burning smell and began running away from the car like a maniac convinced that all my worldly possessions and myself were about to be a flaming 15 second spot on the evening news.

“Chubby motorist burns alive in her crusty Volvo causing severe delays on I-10. Expect significant delays!”

One U-turn by the Boo, a few panicked, blubbering phone calls to my parents and I was alive. Scared and sweaty but alive nonetheless.

The two best men in my life of course came to my rescue. The Boo paid $80 for a tow truck and my Pops met us at the mechanics to pay $300 for new tires (huge hugs ya’ll) but I was still shaken up.

What really got me was when the greased up slightly toothless tow truck driver arrived on the scene and, upon surveying the damage, informed me that I was a “very lucky lady” as he said, if the tire would have blown any more I would have surely flipped the car.

Now that, my friends, is what I call a close one and precisely why I’m convinced that I’ve got someone watching out for me.