I think I'd be a good racecar driver. Just ask the old hispanic woman I almost killed.

In an older post I mentioned that I used to work for Super Shuttle. While I absolutely hated that job, it did provide me with a few good stories. Here's my favorite:

I had just dropped off my last passenger of the night who wouldn't shut up about me doing 80 on a 55 mph freeway. I gave her the usual "I'm sorry that you're such a wuss. That's probably why your kid wouldn't stop crying." speech and headed back to the airport. This was before I got three speeding tickets in one month and finally decided to slow down.

So I'm on the I-17 freeway going south and I'm in the far left lane. You know, the lane designated for people who like to drive as if they're being chased by a T-Rex. (I like dinosaurs. My favorite is the Velociraptor.) It's late in the evening on a Saturday night so the freeway is pretty open.

All of a sudden the SUV in front of me swerved hard to miss another SUV and flipped upside-down, turning over and over on it's side before it crashed into the freeway median and came to a stop. The other SUV spun around and an old Hispanic woman flew through the back windshield and flopped onto the freeway right in front of my van. The SUV continued to spin until it slammed into the median and all I could do was hit my brakes and hope I didn't run this poor woman over.

When I got out to see if I could help I'm pretty sure I looked something like this:

Maybe my biceps were a little bigger at the time
but you get the idea.

I ran around to the front of my van hoping for the best and what I saw was scary and relieving at the same time. The woman was lying on the pavement alive, and her head was maybe a foot away from my front tire. I checked her out and she was okay. She was bleeding and in shock but she seemed in tact. Her daughter got out of the car and ran over to us flipping out. I told her she was gonna be okay and ran over to the other SUV. It was upside-down so I started kicking the back window because the other doors wouldn't open.

It was at this point that I finally looked around and saw that I was the only person doing anything. There were people all around me sitting in their cars just watching. I yelled at this guy to come help me and he did. We opened the back door of the SUV and pulled four screaming girls out. They were hysterical, but okay. One had snot running down her nose and into her mouth, though. Gross. I thought about saying something, but decided against it. Seriously though, I don't care how many times your car rolled over. Wipe your nose.

By this time the police were there so I figured my work was done. I tried to get back in my van but these cops wouldn't stop trying to give me the Medal of Honor so I said, "Isn't that a military medal?" and they were all, "We have extra." Then this lady came up and was like, "You're a hero! Please bless my child. He's sick." and I was all like, "Is it contagious?" (he looked pretty bad) But before she could answer, everyone had gotten out of their cars and were giving me a standing ovation. Next thing I knew I was being hoisted up on everyone's shoulders and people were throwing confetti.

At this point you'd think I'd be crying or asking those cops for money instead of a medal, but all I could think about was the fact that I didn't run that old Hispanic lady over. It felt good to not kill someone. Some might say I was lucky, or that God intervened. But if that's true then why didn't God inspire me to just take a different freeway so I could get home in time for LOST. That police paperwork takes for-EVER!