Twerps, Clavicles, and Blessings

Grumble, grumble, grumble...This is me not in a great mood. After 7 hours total in the car this weekend, 7 hours on an air mattress, 58 hours without power at our house, 6 hours with a headache that is radiating down into my neck, and a sudden (when are they not sudden?) car wreck (my dad and sister, not us...everyone's going to be fine) , it's all I can do to not grumble myself into a corner and pout.

Yet there's so much to do. Our fridge needs cleaning out, our bags need unpacking...I'm sure there's more, but I can't think of a dang thing else. Okay, this is me pulling myself out of my funk to do a little over-the-internet sharing that I'm growing so fond of.

The car wreck happened last night. My dad, Papa-G, was taking my second from littlest sister, Yitto, to a friend's house (she's 16..in case you were wondering). Yitto had been unsure about asking for the ride in the first place (I don't know why...perhaps she was having a rare teenage epiphany about how much parents actually do for us), but went ahead and asked him to take her anyway. On the way, they got into a good conversation in the car and she decided that she had made the right decision in requesting transportation.

Soon they were going through an intersection that they travel through often (it's on the way to Yitto's school). Right then a car doing about 60 plowed into the side of the minivan. Luckily, onlookers were able to immediately call 911. What ensued was a frantic cell phone call to my mother, Mama-G. Yitto was dazed, and didn't really know what do. She asked Papa-G if he was alright, and because of the jarring force of the impact, all he could think to answer was no. So all she could think to say to Mama-G was that she was okay, but Papa-G was NOT okay, not OKAY, not okay.

And the other driver? A drunk teenager who was cruising through a red light. One of the women at the scene of the accident said that he couldn't have been more than 16 by the looks of him. He is in jail right now, so I guess he's just fine. That Fucking TWERP!!!

Yitto and Papa-G were transported to the hospital by ambulance, but Yitto was released very soon. Papa-G, on the other hand, has a broken collarbone. I broke mine (twice) when I was 11, and although I like the story of it (because it makes me sound a little bit like a bad ass), the experience was utterly painful and I don't recommend it to anyone. They both seem alright, but look like they need a lot of rest. Papa-G also has an air of pissed off about him, and I can tell that he's thinking about all the work in the garden that isn't going to get done because of this stupid inconvenience of a fracture....yeah, he really is a bad ass.

Here's the part of the story with the cool twist though. The woman who let Yitto use her cell phone to call my mom last night, called back this afternoon. She wanted to make sure that Yitto and Papa-G were alright, and to tell Mama-G something more. You see, last night when the accident happened, Papa-G and Yitto had been heading East. This woman had been heading West, but was yielding at the green light while Papa-G and Yitto went through the intersection so that she could make a left turn. If she hadn't been waiting for Papa-G and Yitto to go through the intersection, then that would have been her, her husband, and their 4 small children that would have been hit. She and Mama-G cried for a little while on the phone together, as only two mothers can. Who knows what would have happened had Papa-G and Yitto not been there at that time. Before getting the call, Mama-G admitted that they had felt a little like they were being punished for something. Now, it seems that this accident was in some way a blessing. It's amazing how different things can look when you add another perspective.

Okay, so I'm feeling less grumpy already. Thanks for the cathartic release.