I went splat

Five days ago on Thursday I spent a lovely evening at my friend Corin's house, eating pizza and drinking beer. I had a very good time. Unfortunately, I had to work the next morning and ducked out early. I went downstairs, unlocked my bike, and set out for home.

I usually cut over to Ankeny st. when biking home from the East, but recently had been making a straight shot down the low traffic of the nighttime Stark st. I did this on Thursday. I had a pleasant, car free ride for ten blocks down Stark, which was half luck of having low traffic, and half my high rate of speed to keep cars from overtaking me. At 25th, alongside Central Catholic High School, I looked back over my shoulder and spotted a car gaining on me from about two blocks away. With the 20th avenue light in my sights, I gunned my speed, desiring to beat the car to the light.

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I stood up on my peddles, and swayed my bike from side to side with my peddle strokes to accelerate. One, two, three quick bursts of power into my gears was as far as I got. Somehow my front tire caught the pavement at an unfriendly angle to the left. The friction overwhelmed my firm hold on the handlebars and instantaneously forced the wheel at a ninety degree angle to the direction I was traveling.

There was nothing to be done. My face impacted the asphalt before I could even consider my situation. A loud crack, and then Blackness.

I have never lost consciousness before. To "black out" is an extremely apt term for this, as Blackness was the overriding sensation; a void total and complete. Yet, somehow this is my most clear memory of the accident.

When I came to I was upside down, still hurtling through space, continuing to my back. I used some unspent momentum to carry myself to a sitting position. Blood fell to the ground between my legs. I quickly explored my visage with my hand and found it ruined. Lacerations, broken teeth, the works. I looked behind me and found my bicycle about six feet away where I had left it. My lights, still flashing, scattered between us.

I scrambled to my feet and dragged my belongings to the curb for fear of being run over by the car that I had initially fled from. It wasn't there. Must have turned off of Stark. At this point I called my Folks at home. My dad received the who, the what, the where, and was speeding towards me in the car before I could groggily relate the why and the how. Two passersby stopped to assist me, did what they could, and I sent them away, assuring them that help was coming.

At this point, I took a picture of my face, wanting to see what caused these people to wrinkle their brow with concern.

Hmm, interesting. I'm not sure what came over me, but I posted it to Facebook while I was waiting for my dad to show up. Almost immediately I was getting calls and text messages.

My dad showed up, gathered me and my things into the car and set out for the hospital. The urgent care was closed at this location, we were sent away to Sunnyside Hospital, seven miles from where we were.

Upon arrival, I was wrapped up like a mummy and almost immediately sent away to get a CT scan.

I was pretty concussed, fading in and out, talking jovially with my dad and the hospital staff.

I was given a bed and a tetanus shot. Then we waited.

A nurse came along and gave me numbing shots directly into my wounds. This was very painful. Then we waited. Another nurse came along and cleaned out my lacerations with saline solution, blasted full power from a special syringe. Then we waited. This is what I looked like at that point.

The Doctor then came along and began to stitch me up. The local anesthetic had worn off while we waited, so it had to be repeated. The stitches were no fun. He finished and left. Then we waited.

I was wheeled into the radiology unit to get X-rays of my shoulder, but my right shoulder was hurting, not my left as it said on my file. They couldn't proceed until the doctor approved so they wheeled me back into my room. Then we waited.
I was certain that I did not need X-rays, having full range of motion in my arm and only muscular soreness. Eventually the Doctor came around and I told him as much. The X-rays were canceled. Then we waited.

Finally a nurse in Portland Trail Blazers scrubs came by to tell us what we needed to know about my Vicodin prescription, and how to watch out for signs of trouble from my concussion. Finally, after hours and hours, we were sent home. I spent the night with my folks so they could keep an eye on me. My poor father had worked a thirteen hour day at his school for open house night and then, upon getting home, promptly set out to pick me up from the side of the road. We got home at 4am. He went and taught school the next day, God bless him.

Now I am recuperating. The Vicodin and Ibuprofen are working wonders. The most trivial of injuries is causing me the most discomfort.

Road rash on my right elbow painfully cracks open every time I move it. My teeth are pretty fucked. I am going to need a root canal, a crown, a filling or cap, and maybe one pulled. None of this can happen for two more weeks as we wait for the swelling to go down.

All and all, I feel much better. Here is how I look today: