Hitting Cars

Life’s many paths do not all go in different directions. Some can be parallel, some can run roughly the same way, and some, no matter how different they may be, will come together briefly and get muddled in the crossroads. This past weekend was on of those crossroads. I had gotten myself off of the path of self destruction I was tumbling down. I had found a new, more positive path, and was beginning to do very well, but Fate can be funny. Some times Fate thinks it’s necessary to remind you of what you’re leaving behind, lest you forget. Some times Fate thinks it’s necessary to throw you into a bad situation, or a car, to teach you a lesson. This was one of those times:


The weekend started innocently enough. I got home from work, had a shower, and started doing some dishes. I was on the pots and pans when the phone rang. It was Offshore.
“What are you doing?”
“Some dishes, what’s up?”
“I want to show you something. Meet me at the marina.”
I knew what it was going to be. Offshore had a new toy. I left the pots in the sink, and walking up to the dock I found him parking a brand new boat. A very sweet brand new boat. After a quick jog to the beer store we were on the water. I got drunk fast, it must have been the altitude. We spent a few hours in the boat, went back to Offshore’s for a while, and then to a keg party. That was where my weekend started spiraling. I used to be pretty self destructive. I did some stupid things without regard for life or limb, and have paid the price physically. I think this past weekend was a throwback to that, though I have no idea why it occurred. At the party I decided it was a good idea to try long boarding, even though I have never skated before. I took a long board out to the road to try to ride it to the bottom of the hill. I didn’t make it far. A speed wobble is a difficult thing to get out of if you don’t even know what it is. I quit after a few tries, once I had road rash all up one arm and was pretty sure I’d separated a shoulder. I woke up early Saturday morning on Offshore’s couch, a little sore, and went home to get a few hours sleep in my own bed. I needed real rest, because the plan for Saturday was to go to Victoria for Toneberg’s mock stag. The spiral continued out of control.

Partying on Shelley Street is often a bit of a mosh pit, and since this one was a mock stag, it was kicked up a notch. A mock stag is much like a real stag, the only difference being that nobody is actually getting married…we think. It was out of control before it started. The drinking began around 4pm and at 6 I wanted to go to a hockey game. Unfortunately for us a sober driver showed up just in time. After much deliberation Fate decided we should take the Suzuki Samurai, all 9 of us. It was cramped to say the least, arms and legs hanging out everywhere. We made it to the game and halfway back before we were stopped by the cops, but in true X A-Lister’s form, we did not go quietly. One person yelling “Scatter!” was all that was needed to send seven guys running in every direction through a residential neighborhood. Three even got away, one of those being Catfish who instead of going home decided to hide in a tree house and make bird calls while the cops grilled us. Our driver was still sober and passed two breathalyzers, two because the cop refused to believe we were smart enough to have a designated driver. We spent about an hour with three police officers while the whole neighborhood crowded around or watched out their windows and took pictures. They ran all our names through the system, and we learned that Kwa Benna is a victim of identity theft. Somebody has been arrested three times in Comox for petty thefts using a driver’s licence with Kwa’s name and number on it. Apparently they reported his licence stolen and were issued a new one with their picture. Kudos to the BC government for that one. Whoever did it is at large, and the cops weren’t sure if they should let Kwa go in case he actually was the criminal. In the end though, they let us all leave with a very stern warning that we were not to go outside for the rest of the night (it was barely evening at that point) or we would be arrested and thrown in the drunk tank. In hindsight we should have heeded that warning.

Back at Shelley Street the festivities continued. Beers, Caesars, and a little Cacique thrown in for good measure found us having a full contact two on two soccer tournament in the kitchen. Shelley Street kitchen ball is always a disaster in the making. I was partnered with Monster Mck and when it was our turn we came out fighting, but obviously not hard enough. I remember slamming J-Tyme into a railing and then being blinded by an explosion of light, as if a flash grenade had gone off in my face. I don’t remember seeing Salty coming. As I was opening my eyes I can clearly remember Kwa saying, “He’s really hurt guys,” and when my vision cleared I found myself on the floor at the base of a shiny white dishwasher. I couldn’t figure out how I got there. They helped me up and I felt the back of my head where it had struck that white metal object. “Probably have a pretty good concussion” I thought, “and the only cure for that is to try to forget it happened.” The night continued on, ever spiraling.

After a while some of the guys wanted to go out. We scattered again. Some guys went downtown, some went home, and I found myself in a bar, with security like an airport, with Catfish, Monster Mck, Party Mark 2, and Zed Spread. The drinks kept coming. We closed the place and went to a house for a while but it sucked, so we decided to go for McDonald’s. As we were walking out of there I was hit by a headache that was so bad I had to sit down. All I could do was grip my head, grit my teeth, and wait for it to go away. When it finally did I got up and broke a board with nails sticking out across Party Mark 2’s back. Then we got in a truck and drove away, with Catfish and I riding in the bed. We’ve almost hit bottom…

I still have a hard time piecing together the events that followed. There is a gap of five or six seconds in my memory. I can remember a beer bottle being dropped out the back window into the bed of the truck. I can remember picking it up and then starting to stand to do something with it. I remember darkness, the sound of glass shattering, and for a split second feeling like I was in a rock tumbler. I could hear the screech of tires skidding to a stop and frantic voices yelling. I heard doors slam, and footsteps quickly coming towards me. I opened my eyes, or my vision cleared again, and found myself on the road at the base of a shiny white car. I couldn’t figure out how I got there.

“…where’s the truck? What the hell am I doing here...?”

I couldn’t feel any pain, but I could tell from the way the guys were talking to me that something was very wrong. Then it struck me, like I had struck that car, “Fuck me, I fell out of the truck.” Somebody was holding my hand. They were talking to me, telling me I was going to be okay, asking if I was okay. They wanted to help me up, to get me back in the truck, but I told them, “Do not touch me.” I was starting to think clearer and didn’t want to move unless I was sure I could. I moved my arms, they seemed ok. I moved my legs and they worked ok, although there was an intense shooting pain in one. Then I shifted my torso, only slightly at first, carefully, just in case I had some internal injuries, but I felt okay there too. “I think you can help me up now.” Two of the guys pulled me up and put my arms around their necks. I knew right away my knee was destroyed. My foot hurt a lot too, like there was a bone broken in there somewhere. I couldn’t really put any weight on it so we five legged walked to the truck, and put me in the front this time. Then we went to McDonald’s where we had another run in with the cops, but that is another story entirely, and not necessarily mine to tell. From McDonald’s, Catfish and I went back to Shelley Street. He took good care of me, made me sleep in his bed so he could keep an eye on me, and even gave me underwear because I wasn’t wearing any (though I suspect that was as much for him as me). The next day I came home to rest and recover, and try to figure out just what went wrong.

I still don’t really know what happened Saturday night. Nobody seems very sure. Party Mark 2 was looking back when I went out and he claims it looked like I just floated up and out of the truck as if I had wings. It was as though a higher power recognized that I had stepped back onto a path I had only recently escaped and decided to do something about it. An invisible hand reached down, plucked me out of the truck, and unceremoniously slammed me into a parked car (a car that looked exactly like the dishwasher from earlier in the night. Is there something to that?). In all the uncertainty about what exactly transpired we can all agree on one thing; we were probably doing about fifty or sixty kilometers an hour when I hit that car. We weren’t speeding, but we weren’t exactly wasting any time either. We were just driving down the road as if everything was okay, completely unaware that there were other plans for me.

If I can draw a conclusion from all of this, what should it be? I don’t think I’m back on the wrong path, but maybe I’m at a time in my life where two paths have converged, and it’s up to me to decide which one to follow when they split again. For now at least I’m going to stick to the slow lane and take some time to think. That way I’ll have time to read the signs and to take the right exit, or at least not the wrong one. Or maybe I should just stick to country roads completely.