exactly one month ago yesterday

today is the 17th. exactly one month ago yesterday, something happened in my life that i shall, from this moment on, refer to as the 'accident'. cuz there are no real accidents. right, universe? right.

today i have my physical therapy appointment. i'm going to acupuncture on a weekly basis. same for massage therapy, if the lady would call me back finally. all for free. and by free i mean insurance is covering it. insurance is also covering 70% of my lost wages as a direct result of injuries incurred in the accident. ahem, 'accident.'

allow me to explain. but first, my tea water is boiling.. .

ok, enough suspense: i got in a car accident driving home from the airport after being gone in Europe for 7 weeks. i had been up for about 26 hours already (7 hour layovers in Newark are bogus). we (my cousin f, whom i was flying with) landed in PDX around 1130pm. my mom and other cousins (j (f's brother (more info than you need to know)) and his daughter) picked me up. f caught a different plane home and it was 1230 ish in the morning by the time we got out of there. driving off in my mom's minivan, we headed to gresham to drop off the cousins. there was no one else on the road so it was hard to miss the suv that was headed towards the intersection we were about to pass thru. heading towards, not slowing down, not stopping, oh god, impact. he came at us from the right, i was sitting front passenger seat. at the critical moment, i did not see my life flash before my eyes. i saw, in non slo mo, non sped up, perfect time, car hit car, metal buckling, my limbs tossed around despite best bracing efforts. it happened fast. 1st impact, then 2nd as both cars bounced and reconnected, 3rd as we parted ways and ran into the pole on the corner of the street. deafening crunches followed by a split second of absolute quiet, followed by crying, my mother's, my little cousin's. jesus fucking christ. what the hell just happened.

sober, 19 yr old dude from Gresham ran a red, that's what happened. there happened to be a police officer watching that intersection at that moment. i count that as one of the extremely lucky details of the evening. that no one died, that no one was seriously injured (mom got a broken wrist and major bruising, that was the worst of it), that i am covered by my mom's insurance, that i am covered by dude's insurance, all get filed under that same heading.

insurance, with it's paperwork hoops in triplicate, is tending to the mending of my body. my mind, my other non physical bodies, on the other hand, are under the care of yours truly. . . .