Things that Go Boom

Yesterday afternoon I heard a very, very loud bang.  I was downstairs preparing lasagna and the kids were watching TV.  I almost told them, "No," when they asked to watch it, but I was so glad I said yes.  When I opened my front door, I found that a van had struck my neighbor's house.

I called 911 as I stood on my stoop and made my way over to give details.  The airbags went off.  Three women, 4 children.  The most visible injury was a little gal, maybe 4 or 5 with a large gash in her leg.  It wasn't bleeding badly, but it was very deep--like I'd never seen that part of a person except in a textbook deep.

It seemed to take forever for help to arrive.  The driver was in a panic and stayed on the phone almost the entire time.  She told me that she couldn't get her van to stop.  I really don't know how long it was that we waited.  I took long enough to run home and check the kids (completely engrossed in the TV) and grab a bandage (the long kind I bought for Kate's incision) for the little gal and try to comfort the two children who were in the middle row--the itty bitties in the back were still in their carseats and scared, but looked okay.  Once the fire department arrived I left, so as not to be in the way.  The driver called her husband, I presume, who arrived with a car load of people, plus there was the family from the house that was hit, so I wanted to give them room to work.


Only one ambulance arrived, but two more were sent eventually.  After everything settled down and the only person left was a police officer waiting for a tow truck, I went to check on my neighbor, who had been in shock during the whole affair.  When we chatted, she told me that she thought there had been a bomb because of how hard her house shook.  The vases in her room upstairs had broken, but she was thankful it hadn't been the day before, when her son had been outside riding his skateboard.  Her front steps are demolished, but hopefully that can be fixed for her soon.


It was such a random thing.  I was grateful I could be there and also grateful that as far as I could tell, everyone's injuries were very treatable.  And so very grateful that no one's children were playing outside.