A couple of evenings ago (2013), while enjoying dinner with Barry, we reminisced over that night when he and Steven had ridden in the back seat of their friend, Tina's ancient, iron clad tank, otherwise known as a BMW. After pulling away from our semi-circular driveway, these three stopped about a block away and beeped the horn, signaling Joy, another friend from high school, to run out of her front door and slide into the passenger seat next to Tina, who'd chosen to be designated driver that night.
As fate would have it, these four, young adults had just pulled out of our quiet, neighborhood side street and onto a major thoroughfare when, seconds later, a wildly careening vehicle shot out from another side street, speeding so fast as to barrel, unexpectedly into the trunk of Tina's tank, and the sudden force of this powerful impact threw our young friend's conscious sense of awareness for such a loop as to suggest that any responsible driver would have lost control of the steering wheel, causing the BMW to swerve, jump a curb and flip upside down, landing solidly on its roof, which had been supported by iron rather than canvass, thank God!
Since Barry and Steven had not been belted in back (the law stipulating front seat belts at that time) they'd been tossed around inside that upside down car. As to the girls, who had been belted in compliance with the law, they ended up hanging, suspended upside down while the boys got busy kicking out a window in hopes of all four getting out quickly in case the car burst into flames.
As Barry described it, the doors had crumpled, so this smashed out window proved their only escape. Then my son went on to say that upon unbuckling themselves, the girls' heads, serving as protection for two frantically scrambled brains, plummeted straight down, hitting the upside down ceiling of the BMW with a painful bump-bump, and after taking a moment to right themselves, Tina and Joy climbed, dizzily, out of the smashed window after my sons.
In hopes of clarifying these facts, I questioned Barry about that crash when Fate had deemed a stranger to die while Lady Luck cradled four, young adults close to her nurturing heart ... And while every parent, who'd rushed to the scene, gathered our precious offspring into our arms, we all felt chills trembling down our spines to think of what Fate might have doled out on that fatal night had the BMW careened, headlights first, into the brick wall, which had smashed the stranger's car into an accordion, thus ending a life of which we came to know not even one fact other than this one: Some poor guy, who died instantly, had come to a sad end after having made the choice to imbibe too much to drive safely on that fearsome, Thanksgiving night ...
BTW if you'd like to know who said... 'the wall always wins' ... Well, I'm quoting a race car driver, who was called to the scene of the crash, that night ...
As fate would have it, these four, young adults had just pulled out of our quiet, neighborhood side street and onto a major thoroughfare when, seconds later, a wildly careening vehicle shot out from another side street, speeding so fast as to barrel, unexpectedly into the trunk of Tina's tank, and the sudden force of this powerful impact threw our young friend's conscious sense of awareness for such a loop as to suggest that any responsible driver would have lost control of the steering wheel, causing the BMW to swerve, jump a curb and flip upside down, landing solidly on its roof, which had been supported by iron rather than canvass, thank God!
Since Barry and Steven had not been belted in back (the law stipulating front seat belts at that time) they'd been tossed around inside that upside down car. As to the girls, who had been belted in compliance with the law, they ended up hanging, suspended upside down while the boys got busy kicking out a window in hopes of all four getting out quickly in case the car burst into flames.
As Barry described it, the doors had crumpled, so this smashed out window proved their only escape. Then my son went on to say that upon unbuckling themselves, the girls' heads, serving as protection for two frantically scrambled brains, plummeted straight down, hitting the upside down ceiling of the BMW with a painful bump-bump, and after taking a moment to right themselves, Tina and Joy climbed, dizzily, out of the smashed window after my sons.
In hopes of clarifying these facts, I questioned Barry about that crash when Fate had deemed a stranger to die while Lady Luck cradled four, young adults close to her nurturing heart ... And while every parent, who'd rushed to the scene, gathered our precious offspring into our arms, we all felt chills trembling down our spines to think of what Fate might have doled out on that fatal night had the BMW careened, headlights first, into the brick wall, which had smashed the stranger's car into an accordion, thus ending a life of which we came to know not even one fact other than this one: Some poor guy, who died instantly, had come to a sad end after having made the choice to imbibe too much to drive safely on that fearsome, Thanksgiving night ...
BTW if you'd like to know who said... 'the wall always wins' ... Well, I'm quoting a race car driver, who was called to the scene of the crash, that night ...
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