How to Save a Life

Last Saturday, this accident happened about 30 minutes from here. It's in a part of the city that I frequent, as I drive right by there to get to the school I teach at and my dad also drives through to get to work. But, it was a Saturday--neither one of us had to work. He was, however, still in the area because my brother had asked for his help putting some flooring in his house and you have to go down this highway to get to my brother's house.




It seems that this accident happened directly in front of my dad's car. He pulled over and ran up to help. One car (the black one that isn't a van) was, before impact, a ford focus. Was it black before it caught fire? We have no idea.

My dad had bought us all these "get the crap out the car" hammers some years ago you're supposed to use to break your window if you wreck and your car is submerged or your doors are busted shut, or there's even a knife to cut your seatbelt with on the same hammer. He came home and told us we might as well throw it away because it wasn't going to break anything and it certainly wasn't going to cut any seatbelts.

He said he couldn't do anything for the girl in the focus who drove her car the wrong way on the highway head-on into a mother with her two daughters, her friend, and her friend's daughter in a minivan. My dad managed to get most of them out of the busted minivan while the focus went up in flames, but the mother--the driver--was killed on impact. Two of the teenage girls were in critical condition immediately after, one was treated and released, and the older woman was in fair condition.

He didn't tell us about this until Sunday. It's scary to think how close it was to being him, how horrible it is for those families, and I can't even imagine how horrible it must have been to have to pull kids out of a crashed car knowing their mother wasn't alive in the front seat.

You know, my dad's always been special to me, but sometimes it's easy to forget how awesome he really is.