one second and everything changes
Something big happened (or didn't happen) to me the other day.
It was one of those "sliding door" moments that I have tried not to think about to much, lest it twist and tweak my fragile psyche. In fact I consciously put IT in my mental outbox immediately after IT happened (or, as I said, almost happened) so as not to confront the big heavy questions IT conjures up - but then IT keeps popping back to my inbox like unwanted spam.
So, I just thought I would write it down and chew on it here.
What happened?
Well, I came within an inch, maybe less, of being seriously pummeled by a moving car while I was running the other day. And yes it was my fault - I did something stupid.
The car in question was a fast moving BMW. I have no recollection of seeing the driver's face. I do recall seeing a woman sitting in the passenger seat and she reacted to me - she saw me - she got all bug-eyed behind the silent glass. The visual connection was instant and strong but I can't say what she looked like - no recollection - only saw the whites of her eyes. The driver of the BMW pounded the brakes hard - SCREECH!! as I stupidly darted across one of the busiest streets of my city and directly into his path.
Why did I do this?
Well, I thought I had judged (mis-judged is the operative word here) a slight break in the traffic pattern. I was moving at a nice clip - deep in the pocket - grooving to the runner's rhythm where you don't want to stop to long for traffic lights; eyes darting & deciphering the stimuli - picking out my line. I believed I could squeeze/weave through this particular traffic pattern - ala the old video game FROGGER - with no problem. I do it all the time: I was "in the zone" of my run.
Though this particular BMW was "hidden" to me behind another moving car - the one I believed was the last car passing (the BMW was truly in my blind spot) and as soon as the other car passed me by I went for it and leaped right into the BMW's oncoming path. SHIT! It's the one you don't see that kills you.
But I saw it, oh fuck yeah did I see it, about a fast millisecond after making my move, and I knew I had badly miscalculated this maneuver. So, in mid-air, my survival instincts kicked in and I re-calibrated the move: my adrenaline pump fired into action pumping life juice through my fast beating heart and the deep primordial instinct to LIVE kicked into gear.
I twisted my body, throwing my shoulder sideways and swivelled my hip, just as a quick thinking football player might do when avoiding a hard tackle; my left foot came down sideways, acting as a sort of brake and I heard the rubber on my soles actually make that squeaky rubber-meets-the-asphalt sound and I could FEEL the steel of the driver side door whoosh past my bare leg. I pushed off my left foot and danced back to my right foot and by this time I had cleared the mass of the BMW. Though the equation had changed since I started a few seconds before: new traffic registered across my neural pathway, coming at me fast - in fact the entire traffic picture had changed as the BMW's added presence created a million new mathematical dimensions to this Fischer/Spassky chess problem - a problem that I had to work out FAST or else (I was in the middle of a four lane). So, like a dumb ass deer or a scared dog, I just continued to react to the FEAR - much like a darting squirrel might do and bolted for the other side of the street and hoped like hell no one hit me.
I made it. I jumped the curb and I just kept running - fast - without looking back (mostly out of embarrassment for being so fucking stupid).
My heart was POUNDING from the insta-power-surge-jolt of pure adrenaline that had literally just saved my life (or kept me from being seriously injured: I remembered I had just that very day changed my health insurance plan to a lower rate with a higher deductible - so I am quite glad that I did not have to test out the new plan). I was also quite literally pumped from the close shave, and I ran harder and faster until I just had to stop and take a breath.
All I know is that this was the closest personal near death experience I have experienced for a very long time.
What does it mean? Was I spared for a reason? Was I just damn lucky? Or was I just quick on the draw? All of the above? Who knows? All I do know is that I am still here: breathing and healthy.
But as I was running yesterday - I just thought - "wow, I might be DEAD now or paralyzed or on life support in some ICU - these last two days would have been two days where I no longer even exist!" And life - the rhythm of the world - would still go on without skipping a beat - just a tiny grain of sand flicked unceremoniously out of the cosmatomic sandbox. Then, I thought - there really is no escaping it - we're all fucked - it's going to come and it might just come in a dumb ass millisecond - on a nice sunny day - while running.
the moral? Am I who I wish to be when it comes? Not yet. Not by a long shot.
It was one of those "sliding door" moments that I have tried not to think about to much, lest it twist and tweak my fragile psyche. In fact I consciously put IT in my mental outbox immediately after IT happened (or, as I said, almost happened) so as not to confront the big heavy questions IT conjures up - but then IT keeps popping back to my inbox like unwanted spam.
So, I just thought I would write it down and chew on it here.
What happened?
Well, I came within an inch, maybe less, of being seriously pummeled by a moving car while I was running the other day. And yes it was my fault - I did something stupid.
The car in question was a fast moving BMW. I have no recollection of seeing the driver's face. I do recall seeing a woman sitting in the passenger seat and she reacted to me - she saw me - she got all bug-eyed behind the silent glass. The visual connection was instant and strong but I can't say what she looked like - no recollection - only saw the whites of her eyes. The driver of the BMW pounded the brakes hard - SCREECH!! as I stupidly darted across one of the busiest streets of my city and directly into his path.
Why did I do this?
Well, I thought I had judged (mis-judged is the operative word here) a slight break in the traffic pattern. I was moving at a nice clip - deep in the pocket - grooving to the runner's rhythm where you don't want to stop to long for traffic lights; eyes darting & deciphering the stimuli - picking out my line. I believed I could squeeze/weave through this particular traffic pattern - ala the old video game FROGGER - with no problem. I do it all the time: I was "in the zone" of my run.
Though this particular BMW was "hidden" to me behind another moving car - the one I believed was the last car passing (the BMW was truly in my blind spot) and as soon as the other car passed me by I went for it and leaped right into the BMW's oncoming path. SHIT! It's the one you don't see that kills you.
But I saw it, oh fuck yeah did I see it, about a fast millisecond after making my move, and I knew I had badly miscalculated this maneuver. So, in mid-air, my survival instincts kicked in and I re-calibrated the move: my adrenaline pump fired into action pumping life juice through my fast beating heart and the deep primordial instinct to LIVE kicked into gear.
I twisted my body, throwing my shoulder sideways and swivelled my hip, just as a quick thinking football player might do when avoiding a hard tackle; my left foot came down sideways, acting as a sort of brake and I heard the rubber on my soles actually make that squeaky rubber-meets-the-asphalt sound and I could FEEL the steel of the driver side door whoosh past my bare leg. I pushed off my left foot and danced back to my right foot and by this time I had cleared the mass of the BMW. Though the equation had changed since I started a few seconds before: new traffic registered across my neural pathway, coming at me fast - in fact the entire traffic picture had changed as the BMW's added presence created a million new mathematical dimensions to this Fischer/Spassky chess problem - a problem that I had to work out FAST or else (I was in the middle of a four lane). So, like a dumb ass deer or a scared dog, I just continued to react to the FEAR - much like a darting squirrel might do and bolted for the other side of the street and hoped like hell no one hit me.
I made it. I jumped the curb and I just kept running - fast - without looking back (mostly out of embarrassment for being so fucking stupid).
My heart was POUNDING from the insta-power-surge-jolt of pure adrenaline that had literally just saved my life (or kept me from being seriously injured: I remembered I had just that very day changed my health insurance plan to a lower rate with a higher deductible - so I am quite glad that I did not have to test out the new plan). I was also quite literally pumped from the close shave, and I ran harder and faster until I just had to stop and take a breath.
All I know is that this was the closest personal near death experience I have experienced for a very long time.
What does it mean? Was I spared for a reason? Was I just damn lucky? Or was I just quick on the draw? All of the above? Who knows? All I do know is that I am still here: breathing and healthy.
But as I was running yesterday - I just thought - "wow, I might be DEAD now or paralyzed or on life support in some ICU - these last two days would have been two days where I no longer even exist!" And life - the rhythm of the world - would still go on without skipping a beat - just a tiny grain of sand flicked unceremoniously out of the cosmatomic sandbox. Then, I thought - there really is no escaping it - we're all fucked - it's going to come and it might just come in a dumb ass millisecond - on a nice sunny day - while running.
the moral? Am I who I wish to be when it comes? Not yet. Not by a long shot.
posted by Unknown at 7/02/2007 09:12:00 PM
1 Comments:
it goes without saying that i am very glad that you're o.k.
be more careful when running in "the zone" in the future...i like a world knowing that you are still in it.
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