He was driving down a back road on his way to boy scouts. He had just picked up his friend and they were talking about their day at school like they normally do. Music was playing in the background, in fact his favorite song, “We Are Young”, was playing. He saw a pothole in the road ahead, so he planned to go around it. As he approached there was no one else on the road so he moved into the opposite lane to avoid the pothole. All of the sudden another car turned off of a side road onto the road he was on. They didn’t see him, and he didn’t see them. Until it was too late. He swerved to avoid them and went off the shoulder of the road. The shoulder had a steep drop off and his wheel hit a mound of dirt. His car flipped once. Then again. And then a third time. To him the rest was a blur. He managed to get out of the car with only a few cuts on his arms and knee. His first thought was that his parents were going to be mad at him. He frantically began to pick up pieces of the car in attempt to put them back together. A police officer came over to calm him down and then took him over to the ambulance.

She was driving home while talking to her sister on the phone. The conversation was progressing like it always did. How is your family? How is work? Have you heard from mom lately? Another call came through and she asked her sister to wait while she answered it. She switched to the other call and all she heard was “I am the witness but your truck just flipped three times.” Her heart sank. Her son was driving her truck to boy scouts that day. The next thoughts that went through her mind were a blur. She had just put gas in the truck. She had just gotten the carpet and seats cleaned. She needed to get to her son, fast. When she pulled up there were two police cars and an ambulance. Many of her husband’s police officer friends we their and they tried to talk to her and tell her everything was alright. But she couldn’t listen to any of these things until she saw that her son was sitting in the back of the ambulance with his friend and they were both okay. She hugged her son and broke down crying.

I had just left a Mexican restaurant where I attended a Spanish Honor Society dinner. I was headed to show choir practice. I remember being irritated at how much traffic there was, and I was worried that I would be late for practice. My phone vibrated in the seat next to me, but I told myself not to check the message until I got to practice. When I pulled in the school parking lot I reached over for my phone expecting it to be one of my friends asking a question about homework or our plans for the weekend. However, it was a number I didn’t know. I opened the message and my heart stopped. The message said, “[My best friend] has just been in an accident. The truck flipped three times and is upside down. He is ok. Don’t worry.” The first thing I thought was how thankful I was that he survived. The second thing I thought was that I couldn’t believe he not only survived, but he was “ok.” How could I not worry? How could I go to practice and act like everything was okay? When would I get to see him?

In the end, everything worked out. We all realized that life or death situations remind us every day is a gift and we should always tell people how much they mean to us. My best friend could have died that day. His mother could have lost her only son that day. It could have been the end of his life.