A Very Bad Day.

Friday was a Very Bad Day.

My mom's cancer surgery went well Friday morning. I had her home by early afternoon, then MW and LW came out to Shelburne to pick me up and take me home. On the way back home on the Trail, we came around a bend not far from the town line and there was a car driving toward us at high speed, oncoming IN OUR LANE. The road was empty, he wasn't trying to pass anyone, just driving on the wrong side of the road and fast. By some miracle MW swerved to avoid, the wrong-way driver gunned his engine and slammed head-on into the car about 100 feet behind us. It was so terrible, I can't believe we didn't get hit (thanks to MW's fast reflexes) but the poor woman in the car behind us . . .

MW pulled over and stayed with LW, I ran back to see if I could help the woman. Other cars pulled over, people called 911 and men stopped traffic. The woman was in really terrible shape, moaning and barely conscious. The front of her car from the dashboard forward was crumpled like tin foil, all the windows were blown out, and the engine was just gone (I have no idea where it went). Blood everywhere, glass and gasoline everywhere. I held the woman's hand and stroked her hair, careful not to move her, and told her over and over that I would not leave her. Then I felt a six-inch-long piece of glass buried in the top of her skull and nearly lost it. But she was in such bad shape I had to stay with her, I didn't want her to die alone. It seemed like forever but a bazillion police and fire engines and ambulances showed up, and the medics made me leave the woman. We gave our statements and then drove home. We have terrible survivor's guilt, but there is not a thing we could have done to keep that idiot guy from hitting the woman's car. There's not much anyone can do when someone is driving at high speed in the wrong direction.

I called the state troopers in Shelburne to see if I could find out if the woman survived. I was told that she was flown by helicopter to Springfield.

I never did go over to see if the idiot guy was alive or dead. I probably would have started beating the shit out of him for what he did. Some men were keeping him in his car, he was trying to bolt apparently. The car was a black Audi with Florida plates. What the hell the guy was doing driving on the wrong side of the road is beyond my comprehension.

I'm grateful that my little family was not harmed, but I really truly did not need this today or any other day. And I can't stop thinking about that poor woman.