Rollover Thoughts

Events of Tuesday April 1, 2008:

I am in the shower and Chrissie is still in bed. Taryn calls the house phone, there is no phone in our bedroom, and leaves this voicemail.

Tuesday 7:05am
Hey mom, you need to answer the phone. We.., we just.., we just got in a car accident. We rolled one time and we're all fine. The car's not....bad. You need to call us back. That'd be nice. Alright, bye.

Then Taryn calls Chrissie's cell phone which is in the bedroom.

Chrissie comes in and says to me: "Mike, the girls just rolled the car. They're all OK." I respond with, "Holy Cow". OK, cow wasn't the word I used, but this is a G-rated blog.

Chrissie has a hard time getting dressed and talking with Indy at the same time on the phone, Indy is a bit hysterical at the moment. Gib has already left for school on the bus. I arrange for mom to get Mariah off to school, and we leave to go to the scene.

On arrival, the police and the ambulance are already there, hugs go around. Explanations of what happened are given. Water, hydroplane, school bus, steering corrections, telephone pole, off the enbankment and roll in the air three times (as observed by a witness), land on the driver side of the roof, roll until right side up, everyone wearing seatbelts, no injuries besides bodies being shaken up a bit, maybe some bruising on Cory. There is some discussion of whether the kids should go to the emergency room via the ambulance. We decide against that. Cory finally gets a hold of his mom and she is on her way. They decide against ambulance as well, but head out on their own to the emergency room to get checked out. Wrecker comes and pulls the car out of the "swamp" and starts loading it on the flat bed. We leave and return home. Arrange for doctor appt for girls to get checked out.

Thoughts...

The phone call: I would think that the majority of parents of kids in a rollover accident would be receiving this call from an unfamiliar voice and person bearing much more devastating news. What a blessing it was for us to have Chrissie take that call from her own daughter, to know firsthand that they are all OK.

The voicemail: The line "That'd be nice." still cracks me up.

The accident: We let our children drive, knowing full well that the odds are against them. We do our best to teach them good driving skills, to instill a sense of the power they are controlling, and the responsibility of it all. Yet, they have a severe disadvantage in the "experience" factor, and to some degree the over-confidence in their own abilities.

The parental anger: None. I often hear how friends of my children were in accidents and their parents were angry. To me, what good is that. Many times Chrissie tells Indy to be careful when she is going to be driving somewhere, and usually the response is (with a little eye rolling), "I will be careful, I am not going have an accident." To which Chrissie often responds, "No one intends to have an accident when driving." Accidents are just that, unintentional. Avoidable, possibly, but this refers back to the experince factor.

The "What happened?": Curiosity, yes, but other than the need to complete a police report, I am not sure if it really matters. What matters is that the driver, Indy, knows exactly how she was driving and what happened. I am sure that she has gone over it and over it again in her mind. As long as she understands what happened and why, she will learn from this experience.

The Volvo: I remember when we first started looking and researching new cars. I had started it, and was pretty set and convinced that we should get a Mazda Tribute. We even spent a good portion of President's day at the Mazda dealership looking, driving, and discussing. We left, much to the dismay of the salesman, without purchasing. It was still in the plans, but we did not need it immediately so we were going to wait a few months. Well, this gave Chrissie the opportunity to do her own research. The next thing I know, she is out test driving Volvo's. She gave a good argument for the safety features, knowing that Indy would eventually be driving it. So, we ended up getting a good deal on exactly what she wanted from a dealer in Alabama. Even though it was 4k more than we had planned on, looking at it now, it was 4k well spent.

Overall: Teenage driving is and always will be a stressful period for parents. Researchers studying the brain say the frontal lobes — the part of the brain that's responsible for planning, organizing, anticipating the consequences of one's actions — may not mature until a person is age 25 or beyond and that this is a significant factor in teen driving. As parents we plan for the worst and hope for the best. Another Volvo is in our future for the safety it provides. I understand that there are situations that even a Volvo won't help with. Hopefully we won't ever encounter any. I have always said that sometimes life reaches out and smacks your child up side the head and brings them down to earth. I just pray that the price of the lesson is not too dear. As far as this accident goes, we had, I think, the best outcome.