OK, we are still recovering from our 6/1 garage fire that caused lots of smoke damage in the house. Three major jobs to complete; carpets, painting, and unloading the tractor trailer size “pod” taking up our entire driveway. Hopefully by the end of this month 
Sold my 2007 Accord because of repair costs that far exceeded the value of the beat up car. So we were left driving Ms. Wolf’s 2012 Civic with 28k miles on it (it was in very good shape and, yes, only 28k miles).
Our oldest son & family had their annual east coast visit at his in-laws and, as they always do, were going to drive 7 hours to visit us for a few days. Driving 7 hours can be a Herculean task when you have 3 vilde chaya’s (aka our grandsons) in the back seat. So we thought, let’s give them a break and rent place near Woodstock to make it easier for them.
Well, no good deed goes unpunished.
2 hours into our trip, cruising on the NYS Thruway, we were in a pack of cars and trucks. I was driving carefully in the right lane (Ms. Wolf is a nervous passenger), waiting for a large gap to move over to pass a slow truck.
A steady stream of cars and trucks were passing us in the left lane. Suddenly, I noticed some large metal objects fall off a trailer up ahead in the left lane.
Then, one of those strange and rare moments occurred when time seemed to slow down even though we were cruising at 68 mph. My first thought was “oh something” and then I had to make an instant decision. Cars to my left, downward slope to my right, and I decided that driving over the metal object bouncing in my lane was the best option.
Not a good metal crunching sound.
I pulled over to the shoulder, noticed no dashboard lights were on. Good sign, I thought. Cars behind us kept speeding along at 65+ mph. I try to drive to move over a bit more and the car said, nope, I’m not going anywhere. Not a good sign. Turned on the emergency flashers and we exited the car, stage right, and moved as far away from the car as possible.
We look down the Thruway and notice 3 other cars on the shoulder, 2 on the right side and 1 on the left. Called Triple A for a tow and watched cars flying by.
20 minutes later an unmarked police car came by, got an update from me, said continue to stay away from the road, and went to check the other cars.
A couple of minutes later someone decided to brake hard when they saw 4 cars off the road, creating a 3-car collision right in front of us that sounded horrible and created a cloud of air bag powder. The Thruway came to screeching halt.
Now, I’m way to late for this, but long story short ……
No one is seriously injured, our car was totaled, we made it to the house 5 hours late, and we now own zero cars. But our grandsons are damn cute. When they’re sleeping.
My house nearly burned down, I totaled my car, didn’t win a $1.5 billion lottery, and strangely, I feel blessed. No one was hurt.
Looking at an Accord EX, but the extra fees are outrageous. Friends who a car savvy (I’m not) are telling me to wait until the 4th quarter to buy a car. My sister-in-law lives a 15 minute walk from us and she just broke her foot (I swear, I didn’t push her down the stairs on purpose), so we’re using her car for 6 weeks or so.
It’s been one heck of a summer.
