Freak out

A weird thing happened yesterday.

We had a great day with the baby – went to the mall to see Santa, stopped at Build a Bear and made his first teddy bear, and stopped quickly to visit with my parents. We were also able to get out of the house pretty early, so we were already on our way home from my parents at about 5pm.

With the baby sound asleep in the back (no nap all day + Santa + new furry toy = cranky baby who sleeps 7-8 hours at a time), we headed up the highway to home.

To finish the story, I have to tell you this story… before we bought our house, we lived in a really tiny town (it was literally called “The Village of …”). We had a small apartment, and my boss at the newspaper and her husband were our landlords. We lived there for just over two years, and moved a few months after we got married when we were able to move into this house. It was a great two years. The rent was cheap, the apartment was adorable, and our landlords were good friends.

We hadn’t seen them since we moved in March of 2008, but we had them both of Facebook and chatted every so often. We’d do a little wave and a smile when we passed exit 89.

While I was home on maternity leave, I got a message on Facebook from another friend of our old landlords who I used to work with. He told me the husband had been in an accident, and was in really serious condition. That afternoon, he sent a message that he was sorry to report that he had passed away.

He was such a good guy – a great husband, a wonderful father, and an awesome friend. He was someone who could fix anything with a motor, would help you with anything – from fixing your oil heater when it clunks out at 5am to getting the motor on your windshield wipers to function again. He was also a volunteer firefighter with the department in town and EMT who went to every call he could, and really loved what he did.

Now back to yesterday – we were headed up the highway, which is not generally busy. It’s New England, it’s November, and it’s dark. Not exactly a metropolitan area.

Just as we passed exit 89, we noticed the brake lights. Traffic had started to slow down. We figured a car accident, likely a deer. It was a complete standstill. We heard sirens and both lanes of traffic pulled off to the sides of the road to let the fire truck through – the same fire truck that had carried the jacket and helmet of our friend at his funeral.

Eventually traffic began crawling along and we saw the accident. No deer involved, but a wrong way driver. We saw two completely demolished cars, both with their front ends missing. As we drove by, someone was on a stretcher, and another person was being removed through the smashed windshield of the other car. I don’t know why, but I got choked up. And then, as I thought about it, I did know why.
When we were leaving my parents house, I made John stop so I could give my parents something to throw out for me as we pulled away. Just a little delay, but it made all the difference. Bottom line – we missed this accident by less than half a mile and 2 minutes. That could have been us.

I started to think about it and nearly had an anxiety attack. It’s one thing to get stuck in traffic and eventually pass the accident. To see it and see the wrecked cars. It’s another to see that someone barreled down the highway for more than a mile in your direction and hit someone less than a half a mile ahead of where you were. That could have been us. With the baby in the back, and one of us being pulled out the windshield. That could have been us. Our friend would have been a first responder. That could have been us.

I know it sounds ridiculous, but it completely freaked me out. Maybe our friend is looking down on us and delayed us a few minutes. I don’t know. Maybe that’s not what happened at all. Maybe it was just luck. It just made me want to hug my husband and my son a little tighter.

It’s amazing what small things make you think about the whole ooga booga of the universe, huh?