It was an accident...

Last night, as we drove home from Rick’s parents’ house after one of his mom’s plentiful Thursday night dinners, we were passed by a state trooper in a very big hurry. As we neared the major intersection a mile from our neighborhood, we could see a dozen flashing lights and realized there’d been an accident. Judging from the number of emergency vehicles, it looked like it might be pretty bad. But as we followed the curious drivers creeping past the accident site, we realized this was merely an illustration of that age old question: How many police officers/EMTs/firefighters does it take to tie up the traffic at the site of a fender-bender? Apparently quite a few – there was at least one fire truck (were there two?), an ambulance, and several police cars. The accident itself was a run-of-the-mill rear-ending, and only one of the vehicles displayed any significant damage. No one was hurt, and there were no shards of glass or plastic or anything else that might have been hazardous in the roadway. And yet two lanes of traffic were blocked with emergency vehicles, their dizzying displays of lights distracting the slow-moving drivers. This was clearly an instance where it would’ve made more sense to move the cars to the large, grassy divider in the middle of the road…

I had the “good fortune” (I use the term loosely) of being involved in an accident directly outside Austin police headquarters several years ago. I was driving in the far right lane of interstate 35, minding my own business, when a woman in the far left lane inexplicably lost control of her car, and slid sideways across three lanes of traffic. She somehow managed to miss every other car on the highway – except mine. I broadsided the passenger side of her car. Neither one of us was hurt, and the first thing this woman did when we got out of our cars was something you’re never, ever supposed to do after an accident – she apologized profusely and declared over and over again, “it was all my fault!” I took a quick assessment of the onlookers – there were at least five or six witnesses close enough to have heard the confession. Excellent. And, since this happened just off the exit ramp from police headquarters, help arrived immediately, we were able to move our cars off the highway, and she repeated her “it was my fault” spiel to the police officers. What’s more, although her car sustained some pretty heavy damage on the passenger side, MY car was practically unscathed. The insurance company gave me a check for about $800, which I never even used to fix the few dents and scratches in the car. I needed the money, and the car was running just fine. It was, all in all, the best accident I’ve ever been involved in. (You know, if accidents can be a good thing…)

In contrast, I was in another accident on my way home from work several years ago that turned out to be a bit more complicated. There had actually been a very serious accident on the highway earlier, and all of the westbound lanes had been closed. This meant that those of us in the westbound lanes had to wait for eastbound cars to go by, until the police officers directing traffic stopped them and allowed us to go through. After we’d waited about a half hour, we were finally given the go ahead to very slowly start moving toward the eastbound lanes. Suddenly, I felt my car lurch strangely, propelled forward once, then twice. At first, I didn’t even understand what was happening. It wasn’t until the third jolt that I realized the dump truck behind me was hitting my car. By the fourth hit, I was completely confused as to why the truck was still hitting me, and by the FIFTH hit, I actually yelled “stop it!” as if the guy driving the truck could hear me. And he DID finally stop at that point, but the back of my (practically brand new) Honda Civic had five huge dents in it.

Because the major accident site was still being cleared, we were directed to the side of the highway where, I suppose, secondary accidents are made to wait. At one point, while I waited there on the side of the highway, I saw Rick drive by in his pick-up truck, on his way home from work. I jumped up and down, waving my arms like an idiot, but he was staring straight ahead and didn’t even notice me there. It was after this particular accident that I first saw the obvious advantages of a cell phone… I bought one shortly thereafter…

Rick and I also discovered the advantages of the phrase, “I’ll be contacting my lawyer” after this accident. The truck driver – who obviously had not been paying much attention – was attempting to pin fault for the accident on me, claiming I’d cut him off. Cut him off when we were all traveling at 5 MPH, apparently. Yeah. I’m an amazing, magical driver. When his insurance company called and told Rick that we’d have to pay, Rick simply said, “okay, I’ll be contacting my lawyer.” Amazingly, after that, the truck driver’s temporary amnesia was lifted and he remembered he’d been distracted by the other accident and was adjusting his radio dials at the time he hit me.

I find it so amusing that simply saying “I’ll be contacting my lawyer” can strike such fear in the hearts of many. I mean, what really makes it funny is that I don’t HAVE a lawyer… it’s not like “my” lawyer is out there taking care of all of “my” legal issues. But when making veiled threats, you have to say “my lawyer” and not “a lawyer” – you have to make them think you’ve done all this before. You have to make those insurance companies think you’re so unbelievably litigious that you have your own personal legal team waiting in the wings. In fact, it might be even better to say, “I’ll be contacting my LAWYERS.” Yeah, that’s right. I sue so often that I need a mighty TEAM of legal counsel to keep track of my many valiant fights for justice.

Actually, I’d prefer to just never have to use that phrase again… so if everyone would please stop hitting my cars, that’d be great.