I was debating whether or not to post this, but I guess it's been long enough that I can look back on it and kind of laugh about it. Plus, Lissa wanted to hear the story and the story tells better in writing.

This happened on my drive back up to Washington at the end of winter break.

I'm driving through the Siskiyou pass summit at about 2 in the morning, and it's snowing pretty heavily. I've been on the road since 11:30 am, so I'm trying desperately to not fall asleep. I slow to about 35 mph and struggle to get up the damn mountain without crashing. Suddenly in my headlights I see the right side railing has severely been crumpled, and my eyes naturally follow it a bit further down to the road to see a white Ford Explorer flipped on its side, wheels still spinning and glass and dirt and wood everywhere.

I audibly whisper [now that I think of it], "Oh, shit." and pull my car up behind. I rush out of the car and see a bloody arm dangling out of the driver side window - the car is on its side. I call out but there's no answer, so I take off my jacket and shoes [don't ask - I wasn't thinking properly] and climb up onto the car door.

I look down through the driver's side window and see a youngish man still strapped into his seat. His head is bleeding pretty badly, but his arm is a lot worse. It apparently got caught in the window as the car was rolling and the soft underside of his left arm is still imbedded in the glass of the window and there is blood gushing everywhere. I call the ambulance but they tell me it'll be a while for them to get there and ask me if I know basic first aid. I tell them yes and that I'll call them back as soon as I can stop this guy's bleeding.

I run to the trunk of my car and grab my big Mag-lite flashlight and a rag and dash back to the car. I slowly grab his arm and pull it off the glass [major ouchies], but he barely notices - just kind of groans. With the handle of the Mag-lite I scrape away the rest of the glass in the window and take a large shard of glass out of his arm so I can staunch the bleeding. I don't want to move him from his current position so I press the rag to his arm as he is, but the bleeding just will not stop. It's quite literally spurting from the wound. I look to see if he's hurt anywhere else - his left leg looks badly broken and his nose and face don't look too good, either.

I take off my belt [a new one, too] and wrap it around the rag to make a makeshift tourniquet and tie it hard. I don't want to completely cut off his circulation because I don't want to be responsible for an amputation, but that's the least of his worries. He's going into shock, so I have to try to keep him awake for as long as possible. I'm sitting on the this car in the freezing cold trying to stop the bleeding in this guy's arm with one hand and trying to get in contact with the paramedics with the other. I'm shaking like hell out of fear and cold and it's been about 15 minutes and I'm wondering why there are no cars passing by, when I realize that there are no commercial vehicles at this time of night and that all the truckers are stuck a couple miles back at a mandatory weigh station. Great.

Finally, about 25 to 30 minutes after the call the ambulance and fire truck comes blaring up the slope. They take the guy into an ambulance and rush him out of there for an emergency blood transfusion and treatment. The medics give me some hot cocoa [which I promptly vomited back up] and some blankets, test me for shock and start asking me questions I don't know the answers to. Where does he live? Was he drinking? How fast was he going?

After about 20 minutes of questioning, they take my contact information and let me go. They said he probably would have bled to death if I hadn't been lucky enough to see him, because there were literally no other cars around. They tell me the guy's in stable condition and that they'll let me know how he is.

...

You think that's the end? Hah.

I get in the car and realize I'm a ridiculous mess. My clothes are soaked with this strange red substance, and my socks are stiff with frozen blood. My face, hands, arms, even hair have blood and dirt and glass and leaves stuck all over. I decide I don't want to drive into Walla Walla and show up at my friend's house looking like something out of a bad slasher film, so I decide to pull into the next gas station to use the restroom.

I walk into the store expecting a very surprised clerk on duty. What I didn't expect was for him to gape open-mouthed at me for a few seconds, then reach behind his counter and pull a gun on me.

...ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!

I nearly wet my pants. Granted, I was wearing jeans and a white shirt and I was completely covered in blood, but why is his first response to shoot me? I throw my hands in the air, screaming "DON'T SHOOT DON'T SHOOT" and try to explain to him what happened.

I always thought I spoke well under pressure. Well, I don't.

The first [reasonable] thing that popped out of my mouth while having a gun pointed at me by a scared-to-hell gas station attendant, while looking every bit like a serial killer gone mad? In order to reassure him that everything was going to be all right?

DON'T WORRY. IT'S NOT MY BLOOD.

...that helped calm him down.

You know how during the most extreme conditions your brain does the weirdest things? I actually laughed out loud [which REALLY didn't help my case] because the thought that kept running through my head was, "Well, at least if he shoots me the ambulance won't take 30 minutes to get here this time!"

LOL!!!

After a while he puts the gun away and is so sorry for the misunderstanding that he lets me use the employee bathroom the wash up. I have a few small cuts on my arms and legs but I seem fine other than that. Now if my heart would stop exploding... After an eternity of scrubbing and getting dried blood out from under my fingernails and throwing the clothes away in the dumpster and wiping the car down and shampooing my hair, I end up sitting in the parking lot with my face in my hands for a good long time before I got back into the car and drive on.

I'm not sleepy anymore.

Afterthought: while I was waiting for the ambulance to come, I was so scared that I didn't really think about what was happening to me. In retrospect, I was sitting in the freezing snow at 2 in the morning on a deserted mountaintop with a potential bloody corpse. With no one around. Traumatic? Yes.

Conclusion: I am a resilient human being.

Written by jihwan at 04:45 PM.

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