BIKE LIFE CHOSE ME: PT 2 "UNDERSTANDING IN A CAR CRASH"

By Paul Notice

A Black Nissan Crashed Into Me Last Thursday..

It was on my way to get some peach-flavored soda water from the Save-A-Lot a couple blocks from my place.

It’s weird when things like this happen on ordinary days. Not when there’s work tomorrow. And that catering gig’s on Saturday. 

You think about those sort of things, especially the instant you realize that, yes, this asshole is really gonna run the light. And that no, no amount of pedaling or breaking is going to change what’s going to happen. You are fucked. Just accept it. Or don’t. It really doesn’t matter because -

Boom.

That’s when his car mashes up your back tire. That’s when your head tries its best to mash up the ground. It will fail. Along with attempts from your shoulder and thankfully your handlebars - which will help relieve some of the impact of concrete smacking into stupid, stupid flesh.

Regardless, the world goes black for a second. I kind of just accept whatever shitty fate that I was given.

I wake up encircled by a very chill group of Blipsters, who seem way too concerned with how much bleeding is coming from my head.

Nevertheless, they are nice enough to humor my neurotic rambling, and lock the Salvador Dahli bike to a nearby parking sign at my request.

They also call the paramedics.

I did not request that.

The Blipsters file a report with one officer as witnesses to the hit-and-run, while both his partner and the paramedics try to convince me that I should take the ambulance to the hospital.

“Look,” I tell them, “That sounds great in theory, but it’s not realistic.”

I’m uninsured.

Not unemployed, mind you, just uninsured.. And apparently now that I need stitches, I am very fucked. Because hospital prices are notoriously inflated, and my bank account is the size of a Koch Brother’s heart.

And as I catch the bus to Kings County Hospital after limping half a mile, I keep thinking of all of my peers who are in the same boat.

I keep wondering why some people are trying to convince us that we should opt out of something that would’ve allowed me to only worry about my health, instead of my wallet.

And I thought about a lot, each time an RN told I needed this many staples, these crutches, Tetanus shot, Percocet - I saw money, I saw stress, and it became really clear there’s something wrong.

Rest assured, come January:

I will have health insurance. 
I will make use of the subsidy for lower-income individuals.
And I will never worry about this again.

The fact that I won’t be the only one experiencing this sort of silent justice next year, is just one of those things you tend to think about after a day like Thursday.
I hate Thursdays.


Originally Published October 4th, 2013. 
Source: thenoticeblog