THE IMAGE ABOVE IS FROM AAA AND I THOUGHT IT WAS APPROPRIATE FOR THIS POST.
This entry is about an experience that I had on good Friday night, April 15, 2022. As of this writing, a mere 48 hours ago. My car had a tire blowout on the freeway! The image is for the safety of AAA's very brave tow truck operators. You can see my video about it at the end of my blog post, and indeed it was a good choice to represent AAA because from my experience, these tow truck drivers take their lives in their hands every time they go out there on a call, As Mohammed, my intrepid tow truck operator said, you never know what you're going to be walking into, who you are going to be running into, who or what may possibly run into you or what you may find out there on the road.
Even though I am including the video, I will describe a little bit about it here because this is my blog!
“EXPECT A MIRACLE”
ADVENTURE ON THE FREEWAY
I had the idea to film this very recent dangerous roadside experience and hopefully live long enough to make a video! Even in the middle of this situation, which you will see was rather precarious to be filming, I took three raw footage videos: First, the traffic coming my way where I was broken down on the side of the freeway on the scene. Then I took some footage of the police officer, officer Barilla) after he arrived and graciously allowed me to film him for a couple of minutes.(Officer B, when you read this please correct my spelling of your name if I have it wrong!) Then I filmed my other roadside savior, Mohammed. Mohammed was the one who changed the tire which was not easy, and the officer kept us safe by parking behind me quite bravely and lighting up my vehicle with his lights. When I was interviewing him on film, I thanked him for preventing me from possibly being struck by some random speeding car with some random nut job driver but mentioned that he was now the one who might get hit! As brave soldiers often do, he just laughed. They take their lives into their own hands every single day they go out there as well. I suppose we all do anyway, but these particular 2 professions put their employees in more possible dangerous situations than your regular person. It reminds me of what some mothers are fond of saying: "Just because Johnny jumped off a cliff would you jump off it too?" Or, "You know, you could get hit by a bus just crossing the street today"
Moms are infamous for saying weird stuff like that. I know because I am one of them. Weird and a mom.
It was really scary, but I kept focus by just doing what I love which is filming for making videos even as the cars went whizzing by!
I am so grateful to be safe and really grateful that we have AAA. When you see the AAA tow truck operator, he was explaining that this was an extremely difficult tire change and it could not have been done by 90% of drivers without expert help. I think I will make one message of this video a recommendation to have AAA to all drivers. This was a rare occurrence, but when it happens you really need help! The last part of this video were some profound thoughts I had after the experience, so I included some reminders visually. Last, I chose some music that I think you will enjoy and hopefully found a good balance of volume between the music and the dialogue. It is hard to hear often what we are saying because of the traffic noise.
This was one of these times when you realize you could have been seriously injured or worse. So I felt deep gratitude to have survived, gratitude for my amazing assistants, and simply gratitude in general. The one observation I make in some text towards the end of the video is that I was on that freeway broken down for almost 3 hours and of the thousands of cars that went by during that time, no one stopped to help me or even see if I was OK. Not one person! So as a suggestion from one concerned human being to my fellow human beings and drivers, please consider stopping to help someone who is obviously in distress! Nowhere that you are going is as important as helping someone in need.
Thank you Mohammed, thank you Officer Barilla, thank you AAA, thank you guardian angel, thank you universe divine and thank you God!
You truly can EXPECT A MIRACLE!
I must say however, that at the beginning of this really terrible roadside adventure I was pretty freaked out! If any of you have ever had a blown tire, you know that there's a very specific and ominous sound that you hear below your car. At first I thought it was the road conditions because they were doing construction in that lane, so I changed lanes but that sound that will haunt my dreams for quite a while continued. Then I started to smell smoke and knew I was in trouble. I don't know what it is about us drivers that can make us so rude at times and selfish, but I was trying to get over to the shoulder and the other drivers were not letting me in front of them to get over there. Just as a cautionary note guys, try to be polite even if you are in a hurry and you don't want to let somebody cut in front of you. They may be doing it because they're in trouble, not because they want to cut you off! I wasn't able to turn on my hazard lights until I actually got over to the shoulder, so maybe people didn't know I was in trouble. But I would think the smoke coming from my wheel well and the piece of flapping rubber might have been a clue! 😱
So here it is! The video of my adventures on the freeway starring ⭐️ Ginny, Officer Barilla, Mohammed and me!