#BehindTheScenes 61 - A Brush With Death
- saraelliemackenzie82
- 5 days ago
- 3 min read
This #BehindTheScenes explores a story from a long time ago, nearly a decade ago now. It was January 2018 actually. I was working early hours at the bank call center. I was also readying myself to leave our current housing situation. My husband and I were planning our marriage at town hall too (yes, we did it that way) and there was a lot of family drama. And the worries about our son's autism! It was an insane time.
You cannot imagine the stress I was under. Everything was in my lap - chores, finances, job, school, everything! And the job was the worst of it. The same routine everyday, with no minute to breath unless someone said so, and abusive customers I could not fight against. I could not stand it! I knew I was meant for better.
One morning, I went off to work like I normally did. It was 4 AM, cold and dark, and I had no fucks to give. It was another day, I had to go to work, and I dreaded the criticisms from everyone and hoped for some bread crumbs from middle management. I wanted so hard to please my mother (who also worked for the bank) and my overbearing manager and get ahead with my career.
At the time, I was working out scenes in my head. Most of it was about dying. What-if situations, most of them wondering what would happen if I moved the car to the bridge, or if that trucker actually hit me, or if I just let the steering wheel go. It was pretty easy to imagine it.
Those scenarios were made easier by the condition of our car. Bad brakes, hardly any suspension and the tires were bald. Not ideal to drive around, especially in a New England winter. Connecticut gets pretty cold and icy, and black ice is a daily danger, especially in the dark.
That morning, I got onto I-84 without a problem and pushed the vehicle to a high speed. In my late twenties, I still had the speed bug and was running eighty MPH in a sixty-five (I believe). I easily passed a lot of cars and trucks, annoyed that they were soooo slow. Eventually, I crested a hill and saw a LOT of lights.
It was EMS, fire department and state troopers. It looked like there had been an accident. I slowed down and eventually stopped, waiting for my turn to move ahead and texting the manager on duty in between. At one point, a state trooper stopped by my window. He told me that the accident was caused by the black ice on the road (a long strip four miles long and what we were on still), and that the next exits were slick. He advised me on my next steps and let me go.
As I drove away slowly, all I could think of was: I really could have died. And I didn't know it. I had driven on a long patch of black ice, a few miles long, and I was doing eighty miles per hour. The car should have flipped over, or slid, or hit another car, or...
A million other situations.
That terrified me, sobered me even. Could anybody have imagined doing such an impossible thing, and miss the obvious consequences? It was a hard lesson.
I never imagined stories about dying again. I knew that I had a guardian angel somewhere and I was meant to be here. That car did not last two years, but the memory still sticks with me...and has been a piece of the puzzle to my trauma.
Does anyone else have similar experiences? Near death experiences? Coming back? Let me know in the comments below, if you are comfortable. Namaste!