Saturday. The family and I are in Houston for the weekend. Since we got in very late last night, we did not get to see anyone. So today was busy spending time with the family. I didn’t even set up my laptop or get online other than watching things on my phone.
There was a big family dinner and party at the Grices’ tonight. We had a big dinner and met Madeline’s boyfriend. He, Joe, Bennie, and I did some driving around on the golf cart. At one point I got left behind, but was starting to get onto the cart already when they took off. So they ended up dragging me behind the golf cart! I supposed that I could have let go and just been left there. But for some reason, clinging on and getting pulled along seemed to make more sense. Luckily, I didn’t get hurt.
We did a lot of driving around tonight giving rides around the lake and exploring the area, checking out neighbourhoods and stuff.
This evening, while everyone was hanging out at the house, Joe, Bennie, and I went over to the Tocco’s house to drink at the bar. Dominica had told them how bad things had been and that I needed some going out and drinking time. So the three of us were over there pouring beers and shooting whiskey.
Joe had bought Bennie a really nice, new pocket knife. But Bennie didn’t want it. Joe offered it to me. I don’t have a nice pocket knife, it’s something that I actually need. So I now have a very nice, expensive pocket knife.
Around one in the morning, they decided to take the golf cart out again. We tried going under a bridge to an area that they never try driving to. It was a really steep incline and when we went through the first time we had to all lean really dramatically to one side to keep the cart upright. On the way back, Bennie was facing backwards and didn’t know to lean again, and Joe driving totally forgot that we were going to fall over if we didn’t lean. I leaned as much as I could, but it was just me and the cart just went over.
I clearly remember knowing that we were going to crash and thinking that it was going to hurt but that as long as I kept my head from hitting the ground that it would only be painful and wouldn’t actually do real damage. So I just held on to the roof handle to keep my arm between my head and the ground and felt the cart come down on me and the concrete ground dragging against my arm as we slid down an embankment. I could feel the skin tearing away, but kept my head protected. Joe came down on top of me as he was unprepared and there is no seat belt.
Once the cart came to a stop, Joe climbed up possibly having broken his foot. I climbed out through the shattered windshield, no worse for wear. My one injury was a pretty significant road rash on my right elbow where my weight was sitting as we slid. We got to our feet and went looking for Bennie who was no longer with the cart itself. We found him thrown from the cart, wrapped around a bridge abutment. I don’t think that he was actually conscious when we first got to him, but he was quickly. Likely he broke a rib or two.
Once we collected ourselves, we attempted to right the cart, but the incline was so steep that the moment it wasn’t sitting on its side it went straight for the water. The batteries, seat, windshield and more were just gone. It was in pretty rough shape. It would have been better off having had a traditional collision.
What is “funny” is that when we had taken the golf cart out, Dominica had told me not to spill my beer. And somehow, through everything, I had managed to keep my beer in my left hand, and kept it upright and intact, not spilling any. So I always had more beer, lol.
My brand new Galaxy S9 phone survived without so much as a scratch. I had thoughtfully put it in my left pocket when we went out knowing that something like this could happen and wanting to make sure that it was on my protected side. I had left my knife behind with Dominica, too, which was good as it would have been on my hip and really hurt me in the crash.
I texted Dominica right away to let her know that we were all okay and the police were not involved but not to ask any more questions or worry that we were not back nor coming back for a while. So the girls back home knew not to panic. Dominica knows not to worry if I tell her not to worry. And knows not to ask questions when she shouldn’t.
We spent probably an hour trying to get the cart back together, but it was going to just go deeper into the water and there was no way for us to salvage it on our own. Finally around two or three, Bennie called Francesca to tell her to bring the truck with the winch.
It took at least an hour with the truck. Finally the cart was able to be pushed back to Joe’s house, Bennie rode back home in the truck and I walked back. It was quite a night. Everyone was really banged up. Thankfully Dominica knows that I’m good at knowing the difference between “this is dumb and we might get hurt” and “this is really dumb and we might get seriously injured” and was able to find it all very funny knowing that I had evaluated the situation and accepted that an accident of this nature was plausible and an accepted risk.