My Street
At about 1:15 AM last night I was getting ready for bed. I had just shut my CPU off and was about to go brush my teeth and wash my face when I heard a loud crash. My room is by the street and I hopped to the window, but didn’t see anything. It was loud enough that I went downstairs to make sure my car and those of my cousin and uncle next door were OK. They were. I didn’t see anything else and got ready for bed. At about 1:30 I shut off the lights and laid down. There was no sleep, only the sound of idling trucks, heavy trucks. I looked out my window again and this time saw ambulances and police cars. I sprung up from my bed and rushed downstairs. The red lights bounced through the front door. I opened the door and saw my cousin and aunt outside. They were OK, but they were looking down the street. “What happened?” I asked. They said a kid had gotten in an accident.
I put on my heavy coat, it was close to freezing, and went outside. What I saw was just like a movie. A huge tire track ran from my house 50 feet to the right. The telephone pole in front of the house was splintered and there was car debris in my yard and in the driveway of my aunt and uncle’s place. All of the focus was three houses down, on the other side of the street from us. A car which I could not make out the model of had hit our telephone pole and veered off at a 45 degree angle, plowing through the porch of a house and then coming to rest IN THE HOUSE of the third house away. It had entered close to the front door and taken out the whole right side of the house! The driver was a young kid and as I walked toward the accident, he was walking toward the police cars with what I guessed was his mother. He didn’t seem to be hurt, but I imagined his adrenaline had to be at an all time high. His car was sitting in the house, with the right side of the frame sagging on top of it. The family inside was not hurt and was standing with some firefighters with a look of shock and disbelief.
The gossip on the street had already started. The night before the guy who lived there had slept on the couch. If he had been there tonight, he would not be with us anymore. His girlfriend was OK and so was their 2 year old son. The police and the firefighters retraced the steps. We could see into the house, into the kitchen. The entire front of the first floor was wiped out.
Everyone stood and waited. The firefighters weren’t going in to the house because it was unstable. There was not a fire. No one was hurt, but the entire neighborhood milled about. I met two fisherman who had been trying their luck when they saw the car speed past them. They said he had to be going 100. He missed his turn, came down our dead end street and ended up in the house. Crazy. Lucky.
I milled about until about 3 AM. I had to get to bed because the consulting gig I have was looming over me. After a cup of hot chocolate, I fell asleep to the buzz of the trucks. Poor family. Poor kid. Or I guess I should say, lucky kid. He’ll get in trouble for this, but he didn’t hurt anyone, so he has a chance to make up for it. Weird stuff.
http://www.wroctv.com/news/story.asp?id=22678