Well, the good news is, at least I looked cute

My boss asked me to bring some computers from our Orem office to SLC on Thursday. We were bouncing around from place to place for meetings, so I agreed to drive and bring them. As I got ready for work, I dropped my toothpaste lid down the sink drain, ne'er to be retrieved. Halfway to Orem, I realized I had left my glasses at home which would guarantee me a headache. At this point, I thought to myself, "Man, everything is pointing to a bad day, but I'm in such a good mood! No bad day for me!" I collected the computers and went on my merry way.

Please indulge me as I break out into song (changing a lyric or two):

I was driving along, minding my business,
When out of an orange-colored sky,
Crash! Bam! Alakazam!

It was rush hour, but going strong at a steady 45-50 mph. Apparently, at 12300 S. traffic bottlenecks and comes to a complete standstill. I did not know this. All I knew was that the car in front of me was suddenly too close and not going nearly fast enough. I slammed on my brakes, but the second I did, I knew it was too late. Sure enough, I hit the guy in front of me, who, in turn hit the guy in front of him, who hit the girl in front of him. The front two cars were stopped, the guy in front of me estimates he was at about 30 mph. By the amount of damage to my car, the cop estimated I was going about 15 mph faster than him, so we estimate I was going around 45 mph. My front bumper came off. My front end was smashed in enough that my antifreeze is now all over the freeway. My airbags deployed. The cover over my light in the back window popped off.

The whole time I was out talking to the other drivers, I was shaking, my chest hurt where the seatbelt had done its job, but otherwise I was fine. The nice guy in front of me gave me his jacket to help me stop shaking, even though it wasn't really all that cold. I got back in my car to find it filled with air-bag smoke, which was really gross, so I rolled down all my windows. When the cops showed up, they stopped traffic to push us all over to the right shoulder. (We had been in the fast lane, but not HOV lane.) Then they gave us all paperwork to fill out. At this point, I hit emotional breakdown point. When I finally had time to just sit, when my adrenaline wore off, when I was all by myself, I suddenly started crying and couldn't stop. At this point, I realized that I needed to call my boss to tell him that I'd be late for our meeting. I then realized that I had no one's phone numbers from work in my cell phone. Chillylint to the rescue, and I started making calls. May I just say that it's difficult to tell your boss that you'll be late for work while trying desperately not to cry? Yeah... it doesn't work. And that was just on his voicemail. Ugh. I'm such a girl. I also realized that I needed to call my mom, but I knew that if I did, I'd just start crying harder, and the cop kept coming by, and I wanted to stop crying. Though, perhaps it helped me in the end because the cop was really nice to me and only gave me a warning citation, so I didn't have to pay for anything. And he let me sit in his car after my car was towed until my ride got there.

While filling out my paperwork, I realized my insurance card was expired. I knew I still had insurance, just hadn't moved my newest card out yet. My paperwork required dates, so I called my insurance company to get the current dates. The main office must have let my agent know, who then called my mom to find out if I was ok after my "fender bender." My poor mother had no idea what he was talking about, since I had yet to call her. I'm sure that's not how any mother wants to hear that her baby girl has gotten into a car wreck. So she called me. Luckily, it was after my uncle had picked me up. Even more lucky, he had a box of tissues in his truck.

Within the next hour my neck, back, and left hip started to hurt, not to mention the raging headache that was growing. At least I'm smart and carry ibuprofen around with me. I slowly worked my way home. Quite literally. I started at the Church Office Building, made it halfway home to a luncheon, went a little further where I met my brother, who took me the rest of the way home.

I have the greatest friends ever. Within hours I had at least 8 people stop by to bring me get-well packages, to give blessings, to bring well-wishes, to just randomly stop by at the right moment, or, most importantly, to just give me a hug and hold me. I think that love really must have a healing power. I really do have the greatest friends. I'm also incredibly grateful for the power of the priesthood and for the worthy elders who are willing to use that power.

It's been decided that I'm a walking miracle. The simple fact that the airbag didn't do more damage than a small bump and scratch (and two broken nails) apparently is a miracle in and of itself. I could go on and on about how lucky I am and the miracles I've seen. The biggest of all is the rate at which I've been healing. Yes, I am still sore, and I have my moments/days that are worse than others. But really, I'm much better than I should be. And I count my blessings daily for this fact.

Now I just have to work on getting over my pride of being so dependent upon other people. I hate not having a car. But alas... I prefer this to being dead or or paralyzed or something.

PS - Pictures to come as soon as the ridiculous towing company known as Cottonwood towing stops being ridiculous and I actually get over my car to take pictures.