Pulling Teeth…Launch Pad…More Human

Sometimes the most unexpected things can drag thoughts and feelings to the top of the brain. Like a dentist pulling teeth, they can pull emotions and memories into the realm of consciousness.

Someone died a couple miles from my house today. All I know is that it was a car accident and it was apparently pretty bad since they had both directions of the highway shut down for about four hours. I probably wouldn’t have even remembered it except that as I was coming home I saw the paint on the highway from when they reconstructed the accident.

It’s really strange that something like this would get me thinking because I’m the one who under normal circumstances would say, “Hey, that’s life. People live, people die; it happens every day.” I’m the one who watches Faces of Death movies and laughs when I get to see authentic footage of people meeting their end. I’m the admittedly selfish one who honestly doesn’t care about stuff like this except when I get to see blood and guts at an accident and then get to brag about the “bad” accident I got to see.

This time though, I didn’t see the accident. I didn’t see any blood or guts or anything. In fact, all I saw was fluorescent paint on the highway marking the spot that was the launch pad for someone’s journey into whatever there is after mortal life, if there is any.

But it got me thinking.

The past year, but the past few months especially, have seen a lot of changes in me. I won’t get into what they are because you can find them, along with “before and after” snapshots of me, buried in my diary here. The biggest thing though is that I finally have people that I care about. I now have someone other than myself to be concerned about.

For no apparent reason a single thought was pulled to the forefront of my mind as I drove over what was the place where someone drew their last breath. “What if that was Allie or Tina or Jen?”

No sooner did that thought surface than time seemed to slow down. The 70 MPH that I was doing seemed more like 30, the music faded into some black hole in the back of my car, and I forgot to breathe.

There really aren’t any words to describe what I felt. Yet I think perhaps I felt a little bit of what the loved ones of the person who died felt. Shock? Denial? Sick? Foreboding? Uncertainty? Fear? Darkness?

Then, as if I was watching the sun break over the dark horizon of early morning, everything I was feeling turned into relief. Relief that I know my loved ones are safe and sound. Relief that I don’t really have to try and cope with the loss of someone I care about. Relief that I don’t have to try and find a way to continue through life without someone that I don’t think I can live without.

I don’t know why this seems like such a huge revelation to me. Perhaps it’s just because I’ve spent most of my life wrapped in a shell of indifference and solitude and numbness. And now instead, I honestly feel sorry for the people whose lives were changed forever on a warm, sunny Saturday on highway 169 in Minnesota.

There are lots of times I joke around with my friends about how they’ve “wusstified” me and turned me into a girlie-man. I think they’ve done a lot more than that though. They’ve showed me how to truly care about someone and disproved my previous theory that love and relationships are overrated. They’ve shown me what it is to feel. In essence, they’ve shown me how to be more human.

I’m not sure if there’s really any way I can ever repay that. All I know is that I value them more than anything. I don’t ever want to take them of granted, because I don’t ever want to look back with regret and think, “I wish I would’ve realized and appreciated what a gift they are.”

If CD players can get sick of playing a single song over and over, mine is probably hating me right about now. For the past two days I keep listening to the song Oblivion by Lo Pro. It kinda describes a lot right now.

*
“I
Can’t hear a sound
Can’t see the world
Cant’ feel the ground
I
Can’t look around
Can’t see the faces
Through this cloud
*
I fade away
Into oblivion
Every second I’m alive without you
*
I
Can’t sleep a wink
Can’t shut you out
Can’t even think
I
Can’t look away
From the train wreck
Of mistakes
*
I fade away
Into oblivion
Every second I’m alive without you
*
I am barely breathing
The grip around my neck
I am barely living
And I won’t make it back
Without you.”
*
Lo Pro