The Accident
On a cold and foggy morning, I awoke to the first day of my last year of high school. Nervous and anxious, I was excited to finally be a senior. I couldn’t contain my excitement as I was finally allowed to drive to school, in a car that I could unofficially call “mine”. As I pulled out of the driveway, my father had his Nikon D60 out, taking endless pictures of my sister and I off on our first day. Driving away, I could hear my mother in the distance in her usual state of paranoia, “Katie, use your windshield wipers, turn on your defrosters!” Too caught up in the moment, the typical teenager I am, I tuned her out and turned up the volume in the car.
Driving along 24th AVE, the road was quiet, calm, empty, without all those lucky ones who got to sleep in that morning. It was quiet, until I got to 198th, about three blocks from my home. I went ahead and began to take the left, the next thing I heard was my sister, at the top of her lungs: “CARRR!!!”.
About 1/100th of a second later, I saw it, a white 1998 Ford Explorer, heading west on 198th, the road I was turning left onto. I felt like I was dreaming, I felt myself yelling “NO! STOP!”, hoping my car would suddenly obey my commands I helplessly yelled to it. But I wasn’t dreaming, I was fully awake, because 1/100th of a second after that, we were both stopped, a giant white streak from the Ford on my car, a dent the size of my car’s front end in side of the Ford.
I had slammed on my accelerator instead of my brakes, and plowed into the other car as fast as my 143 HP hybrid engine would allow me. I sunk in my seat and as fast as everything had happened, everything began play back in my mind. So many things were running through my mind that it all of a sudden went blank, as if it went on overload and suddenly broke down. Everything that followed was truly an out of body experience:
Stepping out of the car to confront the other person, to see if they were alive. The phone call home to my parents. Both of my parents hasty arrivals’. The looks on the faces of my parents: the disappointment, the anger, the confusion, the panic. The exchange of names, insurance cards, information. The first time I saw the damage, my license plate and bits of my car lying on the ground. Being driven by my mother to school while my father brought my car home.
I must have broken down and cried in every single period throughout the day. I had yearned more than ever to go home, but by the time I got home I felt as if I’d rather be anywhere else. I walked by my car on the way to entering my house and I sat there for what felt like hours on end, with the biggest reminder of what had happened that morning. I made every move I could to avoid my parents that day, afraid of facing those whom I had so deeply disappointed.
We didn’t talk about what had happened until maybe a week later.
Alone in the car with my mother, I painfully brought up the topic that I had been crying endlessly over, the accident. The conversation was what I had expected, no they didn’t hate me, yes they were disappointed, yes they were revoking my driving privileges, and yes, I was going to have to help pay for the damages, which were likely to amount to over $2000.
$2000 dollars, that was $2000 more dollars than I didn’t have, and if anything, the money really help put into perspective what had just happened in a matter of one short week. The biggest factor that made the situation all the more real happened a few weeks later though. Driving along on my way to the grocery store, nervous to be driving again, I came to a standard four-stop intersection. As I looked to my right and then gradually to my left to check for cars, I saw a male, in a familiar looking white SUV. It was him, on the passenger side of the car and coincidentally enough, looking straight back at me. There was clear sorrow in his eyes and facial expression, and has he drove away I swore I could’ve seen him shake his head at me.
Maybe he’ll never forgive me, but in the greater scheme of things, my parents forgave me, and I’m slowly learning to forgive myself. In the present, in the moment, the accident was bigger than anything else that was happening, or anything else that had happened. Every day was a battle with myself, struggling to overcome what had happened and to slowly push past it. As I move closer and closer towards finally pushing past it, I’ve realized that although something may seem so big you’ll never be able to overcome it, in the end all is alright, and in the end, bigger and worse things will happen.
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Reflection on Revision!
I would say that I felt a bit different about the revision for the second time, although it's always hard to hear your own writing critiqued, when I know certain parts are shaky but are unsure on how to fix them, I find these writing groups the most helpful. I was unsure of how to write my conclusion, phrasing up everything I've learned without sounding cliché but upon asking my writing group, I gained much insight into how to compose the ending. Writing groups proved quite successful the second time around!
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