The Aftermath

One night last week, my son was driving home from theater rehearsal when he was run off the freeway by another driver. He was forced over lane by lane, unable to get away from the other driver, and finally onto the shoulder, where he lost control of the car, and somehow was launched into the air. The car flipped over a 7-foot fence (without touching it) and eventually landed on its roof on a side street about 150 feet further down the road.
The car is a total loss. The front hood is about half the length that it was before it met with concrete, asphalt, and some juniper bushes. If he'd had a passenger in the car, they wouldn't have made it.
When the car finally came to a halt - on its roof - he undid his seatbelt and crawled out the passenger side window (the driver side window was the only one that didn't blow out), getting his only scratch - on his elbow, from the asphalt as he crawled out. It was as if he was in a little bubble of protection. I still can't believe the way the car looks, and how my 6'3" son escaped without injury.

I've been wanting to post this for almost a week, but was waiting until he had the opportunity to tell some people himself. So if you've gotten a call from him in the last few days, and haven't bothered to call him back, now you know why he called. I believe this has been a life-changing experience for him, facing death in such a dramatic way and surviving. He's lost his independence literally overnight, and is dependent upon his using his father's car (again) until the insurance is straightened out. I'm still trying to come to grips with the whole thing myself. Phone calls at 11pm are rarely good news. Seeing the car did eliminate the waking nightmares I was having about what had happened. We still don't know exactly what happened, or what set him airborne, or why that car forced him off the road and never stopped. I'm trying to keep the "what-ifs" from making my head spin. One thing for sure - this kid definitely has something he is meant to do with his life.