I thought maybe this was actually going to be one of the last moments of my life. I don't think I have ever felt that stark reality before, which may partially explain what happened directly after that thought presented itself in my head.
I was buzzed and biking, going to get food and blowing off some steam. I know I've been cracking lately, there's just been a lot that I've allowed to lean on top of me and the weight is just not balanced correctly. I was biking and shouting, shouting in general at life and frustrations and letting the wind carry away my words.
I don't even know what the exact events were that happened right before, but the truck was right next to me. It could have grazed my elbow it was so close, maybe it did, maybe I was just close enough to losing it for absolutely no reason and this truck was merely reason enough. I reacted, strongly, with the force of a week's worth of turmoil and letdown. I reacted so strongly I could barely see. One person's strong reaction on a bike is one thing, but it is entirely different when the strong reciprocal reaction happens in a truck. He drove onto the sidewalk and whipped the fastest u-turn I have ever seen. The headlights whipped around and snapped into a direct path aimed at me. I don't know how I reacted. It was like a rage filled auto pilot took over my body. I hopped onto the side walk and off of my bike, a part of me thought that if I was next to a pole it would at least fuck up the truck more than my body bouncing off of the bumper would. He screeched to a stop in front of my and my entire body was shaking. I wanted with all of my might to throw my bike at his truck, but I had just fixed it up and didn't have the heart to and so I stepped up to his window and shook it in his face and screamed everything and anything and I can't now pinpoint a single word of it. He whipped another u-turn and I thought he was about to back over me when he gunned it and drove off.
It was probably five seconds, or fifteen, but it felt like the cliched time stopping pivotal moment. I had never thought much about the life-flashes-before-your-eyes moment, but I remember thinking that my mom was right. That I was silly for getting so angry at people who could so easily kill me with the push of an accelerator and the turn of a wheel. I remember thinking that this was a ridiculous way to die.
2 comments:
i like the last two sentences on this posting, about how it was silly to get so mad at someone who could end your life with a turn of the wheel and a push of the accelerator and how that would be a dumb way to die. it's so sickening, really, that you should ever have to consider the fact that someone could purposely hurt you just because you were on a bicycle. i'm glad you didn't die and i'm glad you were able to let out some frustration. one time molly martin and i met a guy she had been talking to on the internet but we didn't really meet him, just told him we would at night in east's parking lot. he sat there in his pickup for a while under the streetlight and we watched him from inside the fence on the field. after a while he started to leave so we went to head home to molly's house. then we realized he was coming our way and so we started to run but he drove really fast up the road to the alley/parking lot by the back doors to east by redline, and as we were part way down the alley, he came up behind us with his lights on bright and vroomed towards us. i made it inside and then molly did (or was it the other way around?) and then i was too afraid to walk home by myself. okay that's not really the same, but the truck and the u-turn reminded me of it. ew.
but it is kinda the same. it's that rush of adrenaline and fear and anxiety all bundled up together. i hate that feeling, especially when it is connected with something like this. ew is right.
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