11/22/2010: A 10th Anniversary
If you'd like to skip this week's post and get the truncated version of this story, then just follow this link and listen to the episode of 4 Cents a Podcast where I tell this story. For the rest of you, strap in because this one's a doozy.
November 22nd was a significant day in History. In 1963, it was the day on which JFK was assassinated. It was on that same day the authors Aldous Huxley, of Brave New World and Doors of Perception fame, and C.S. Lewis, the mind behind The Chronicles of Narnia, passed away as well.
For me though, the day November 22nd, 2010 will always be of greater, personal significance because it was the day, when I was 17 years old, that I got hit by a bus.
Fall of 2010 was the start of my senior year of High School, and like many of my fellow graduates-to-be, I was concerned about what would happen next. With tuition levels skyrocketing and scholarships thin on the ground, the likelihood of me going to college seemed low. So low, it might as well have not existed.
There was one outlying hope though: the A-Plus Program.
This now firmly established program would've enabled students like me to attend community college, tuition free, for two years. That was, at least then, long enough to complete an associates or at least get your General Education Requirements out of the way for a Bachelor's Degree. The catch: you had to do 50 hours of unpaid student tutoring in exchange.
Back in 2010, the program had just been put into place that year for the students in the St. Louis Public Schools District, and it seemed like the best shot I had at any kind of higher education.
I'd managed to arrange to do my tutoring with a student at my old Elementary School, Mullanphy ILC, which was just down the street from my high school, Central VPA. 3 days a week--Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays--after school was out, I'd walk down the street to Mullanphy, do my tutoring in the final hours of their school day with my student, and then leave. Afterwards, I'd then take the city bus home.
On Monday, November 22nd 2010, however, that was not what happened.
I'd completed my afternoon's tutoring that day, and I headed for the nearby bus stop where I always took the city bus home.
In order to get to it, I had to cross a four-way intersection, which, at the time, wasn't exactly outfitted for pedestrian traffic. No crosswalk lines. No crosswalk lights. No clearly marked turn lanes. No turn arrow lights. So, it was kind of "cross at your own risk."
I stood at the crosswalk waiting for the light to turn green, doing exactly what every teenager at that time did: looked at my phone. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see a row of cars lined up at the light, and among them was a big, yellow, flat-nosed school bus. None of the cars, including the bus, had their left turn signals on at the time. Had they, I would've noticed and waited for them to turn. But they didn't so I made the--I don't think unreasonable--assumption that all the vehicles were going straight, the same direction I was.
The light turned green.
I headed into the street.
I made it just over the center lines that divided the lanes.
BANG!
Everything was white for a moment. The next thing I knew, I was making out with the asphalt. I had pain running up and down my right side. I was still conscious, and I realized what must've happened to me. I'd been struck.
Once I'd realized that, only one other thought paraded through my mind: I had to get out of the street.
Wincing with pain, I opened my eyes and got up. I say got up, but staggered is probably a more accurate verb. Nonetheless, I rose from the ground and ambled my way across the street to the other side and summarily collapsed to my ass on the opposite curb of the street.
A sizable crowd gathered around me then. One lady who'd witnessed everything took out her cellphone and called 9-1-1. This same woman was also nice enough to run out into the street to get my cellphone, which had understandably ejected upon impact like an SIM memory escape pod and returned it to me. Since I knew an ambulance was on its way, I knew I needed to make one more phone call to my mother.
That phone call proceeded something like this:
ring...ring...ring...
"Hey. What's going on?"
"Hey mom. I just got hit by a bus."
A long pause.
"Is this a joke, Ian?"
"No, mom seriously. I got hit by a bus. I think my foot's broken. The ambulance is on its way."
"Oh...okay. I'm on my way."
click.
Now, to be fair to my mother, given that I was a sarcastic little asshole at age 17 (which, honestly, I still am, 10 year later), and given that I told her in the most deadpan, matter-of-fact fashion that I'd just been hit by a bus, her reaction is understandable.
While I wanted for the police to arrive, I got to make the acquaintance of two other interesting spectators. One of them was a lady who clearly had never undergone First Aid training because, when she got a good look at me, she said the following:
"Ooo, baby, you better not lie down, You've got blood rolling down the side of your head."
(Like a red Niagara Falls, apparently.)
Having been a Boy Scout, and having earned my First Aid Merit Badge (a required badge for the Eagle Scout Rank, by the way), I learned that one thing you're never supposed to do is TELL THE INJURED PARTY HOW FUCKED UP THEY ARE. Why? Because the fright could induce shock and that could kill them. Clearly, not on this lady's resume.
The second person was an old man, with a long white beard and red baseball cap (this was pre-MAGA, and it happened in St. Louis, so red baseball caps just meant you were a Cardinal's fan). This man came up to me, while I was sitting on the curb awaiting medical attention, and said the following:
"Can I pray for you?"
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes and said, "Sure."
He then proceeded to grab my right leg--my INJURED LEG--and squeeze it in a fashion similar to what we, in Elementary School in our pre-PC days, used to call an "Indian Burn." (If you don't know what it is, Google it.) He then proceeded to recite what had to be the entirety of the rosary while staring at the sky.
I was rusty on my catechism then, buy I was fairly sure that if I punched that old man, while he was praying the rosary, I'd go to Hell. So I didn't.
The cops and ambulance in turn showed up. They questioned me as to what happened, and I told them. The paramedics then took my on board of the ambulance and gave me triage. This consisted of them giving me an ice pack for my right shoulder, wrapping my head in a bandage, and removing my right shoe from my foot, which them proceeded to swell to the size of a football (American, not European).
Shortly after, my mother arrived. By then, my foot was inflated and, due to the thickness and length of my hair at the time, the head-bandage had crawled up my head and resembled less of a bandage and more of a crown made of toilet paper.
The drivers then took me to SLU Hospital, which was a bad call. Since I was 17, I should've gone to Cardinal Glennon, but SLU was closer. Once checked into the emergency room, I proceeded to act like the world's best (that's sarcasm) patient.
Over the course of several, pain-filled hours (they gave me no meds when I arrived), the doctors scanned and x-rayed me only to determine that I basically had no major injuries. No broken bones. No internal bleeding. No brain trauma. No concussions.
In other words, I'd gotten lucky.
Just before we were set to leave, the ER Doctor, who I'd been such a wonder (again, sarcasm) patient to decided to get his revenge.
Remember the blood that had been coming down the side of my face (like a red Niagara Falls)? Well, that was due to a two inch-wide laceration on my scalp, caused by the bus mirror scraping me over the head. Before I could leave, the doctor had to close it.
He gave me the choice of two options: stitches or staples.
Because I have a strong aversion to needles and I'd been promised that it would be faster, I picked staples. The doctor then went away briefly, only to return with what looked like a home contractor's staple gun and several SLU Hospital Medical Students in tow. This was his revenge: for being a total piss-ant to him all evening, I also got to be his Guinea Pig.
He proceeded to drape a towel over my head (presumable to hide the looks of angry pain and tears I'd soon have on my face), and slowly pressed the six staples I needed into my head, while commentating on it to his students like Steve Irwin talking to a camera while his arms were around a crocodile's jaws. Then, to add insult to injury even further, I took part of the towel and pressed the six staples even more firmly into my head "just to make sure they were secure."
On the way out, they gave me some roided-up Tylenol, which kicked in just as my parents got me home, and, within in seconds upon arrival, I was passed out on my bed.
With 10 years officially between me and this experience, what have I learned? I think I can sum that up in one sentence: if you're thinking about getting hit by a bus...don't. Been there. Done that. Left a Zero Star Review.
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