Everything can change in an instant, a point driven home with particular force this past Labor Day weekend when I stopped concentrating on a narrow trail for a split second and rolled my father-in-law’s heaviest and most expensive four-wheeler off the trail and down a hill.
It all happened so fast: the left tire caught a steep embankment, wrenched the steering wheel (and both front tires) into the hillside, and I found myself, in a kind of surreal slow motion, thrown over the handle bars and onto the trail. The four wheeler flipped over on top of me. I felt its weight run down the length of my right leg, and then lift off. Dazed, I rose to a sitting position, only to watch the four-wheeler slowly careen off the trail and begin rolling down the hill, gathering speed as it went. Eventually it came to rest at the bottom of the hill, maybe 100 yards away, and, after a few minutes spent recovering from the shock, I was able to limp down and turn off the engine.
I was lucky. Every year, people are killed, paralyzed, or seriously injured in OHV accidents like that one. By rights, any of those things could’ve happened to me—once the tire caught, the consequences were entirely out of my control—but they didn’t, and I walked away with nothing worse than a scraped and bruised right knee.
Sobering. I still can’t shake that “lack of control” feeling. In that split second, a relatively innocent mistake could’ve ended my life or changed it (and the lives of those near and dear to me) permanently and dramatically.
I feel deeply blessed that it didn’t, and I’m thankful, in an odd sort of way, for such a stark reminder of how fragile life can be and how quickly it can change. And if the experience taught me to be a little more careful, I also hope that it reminds me to savor each moment, each breath, each minute spent with a loved one, a little more deeply, because we can take nothing for granted.
It all happened so fast: the left tire caught a steep embankment, wrenched the steering wheel (and both front tires) into the hillside, and I found myself, in a kind of surreal slow motion, thrown over the handle bars and onto the trail. The four wheeler flipped over on top of me. I felt its weight run down the length of my right leg, and then lift off. Dazed, I rose to a sitting position, only to watch the four-wheeler slowly careen off the trail and begin rolling down the hill, gathering speed as it went. Eventually it came to rest at the bottom of the hill, maybe 100 yards away, and, after a few minutes spent recovering from the shock, I was able to limp down and turn off the engine.
I was lucky. Every year, people are killed, paralyzed, or seriously injured in OHV accidents like that one. By rights, any of those things could’ve happened to me—once the tire caught, the consequences were entirely out of my control—but they didn’t, and I walked away with nothing worse than a scraped and bruised right knee.
Sobering. I still can’t shake that “lack of control” feeling. In that split second, a relatively innocent mistake could’ve ended my life or changed it (and the lives of those near and dear to me) permanently and dramatically.
I feel deeply blessed that it didn’t, and I’m thankful, in an odd sort of way, for such a stark reminder of how fragile life can be and how quickly it can change. And if the experience taught me to be a little more careful, I also hope that it reminds me to savor each moment, each breath, each minute spent with a loved one, a little more deeply, because we can take nothing for granted.
2 comments:
I agree!! We get a false sense of security. We are glad you are okay!
Tim! Well said - how scary. How's your leg?
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