The day I got hit by a bike

Tuesday, September 13, 2005

I read an article today that brought back a childhood memory of mine. I can't decide if it is a good memory, a bad memory or a silly one.

Ok, I will start by saying that there are 8 kids in my family. I of course am the over-protected-spoiled-rotten-get-away-with-everything baby of them all. Or so my older siblings like to tell me. I have a brother that is 4-years older than me and my other brother is 5 1/2 years older than me. The three of us spent a lot of time together, well, actually, I spent a lot of time annoying them. I have written snippets of family life, shared some dark moments, etc. but this one I am just not sure of how to look at it.

In our neighborhood there used to be a traveling puppet show. Our neighborhood consisted of 4 blocks. This puppet show would come every so often and I had always wanted to go and see the show. Something we weren't allowed to do though. My parents, mostly my father, was very strict so we were pretty much bound to that house until my father went to work driving semi's. My poor mother, well, she would just get bombarded when my dad was away...'can we....can we...'.

On this particular day, my two brothers were going to see the puppet show which was usually held on the 4th block. Quite a walk not to mention the pond was my mom's big worry; that we would venture there and drown.

I begged and begged to go and finally my mom relented and gave my brothers the ole lecture, 'be careful, get her home safe, watch her close, home right after' etc.

Oh the excitement was almost too much for my little heart to take. I must have been about 4 or 5 years old at the time. I knew that my mom was allowing me to do something that my dad would probably yell at her for so this made it extra special. But we had to be home right after because my dad was due home later in the afternoon.

Ok, well, we went to this puppet show, which I don't remember much of. It wasn't as much fun as the pictures on the side of the truck made it out to be actually, advertising even back then left more to be desired. It was over even before it started.

So, my brothers and I started on our way back home. Shortly after we began our journey, my brothers decided that they wanted to go check out the pond. They left me on the side of a non-busy neighborhood road, well kind of on the side and told me that mom wanted me to stay away from the pond. Well, she had said she wanted us all to stay away from that pond so I was pouting and standing there really mad at them.

Of course, I had never been off of our property so I was a little scared to be left on the side of the road. As they were crossing the road, getting closer to the grass, my little feet started inching slowly across the road while my brothers kept pointing at me and telling me to stay there. I don't remember the words we were exchanging, just that I wanted to see the pond too.

Well, I looked to my left and saw a kid on a ten-speed bike rounding the corner just down the road, I thought nothing of it, that he would just pass right by me. At the time, he was about 50 feet or so from me but I continued to slowly take baby steps across the road. I looked in the direction of this biker and I'll be damned if he wasn't right on top of me and slammed into me.

My brothers were so pissed off at this kid and at me. But they yelled at him mostly. They yelled, picked me up off the road, and continued to tell me how stupid I was for standing in the middle of the road, etc. I of course had road rash all over my legs, a big boo-boo on my foot and stung, badly.

Now we had a predicament. How were we going to explain this one to my mom let alone my dad.

My issue was, how was I going to walk! I was in a lot of pain. We had quite a ways to get home, 3 blocks to be exact. So, my brothers took me and held me while I limped and they cussed me out and discussed this problem.

We got to a point in the journey, a short-cut. This shortcut was through the grass, grass which was almost as tall as me. I tried walking through it but it hurt an awful lot scraping on my fresh wounds.

I remember my sweet brothers making the decision to carry me. Since they were roughly 8 and 9, this was no easy task. They put their hands under my armpits, hoisted me up and told me to lift my legs to my chest while they lugged me through the 'rushes'. Although I will always remember their attempts at easing my pain, they could barely lift me more than 6 inches off theground.With each blade of grass scraping, I cried owie-owie and they cried shut-up. I would bet that a passerby would've laughed at our banter.

When we got home finally, my mom was more scared than angry. Sadly. She yelled just a little at my brothers for leaving me, asking them what they were thinking, yelling about going by the pond, etc but her big fear was my father finding out that she allowed me to go somewhere while he was away.

I don't remember this going on too long before my father pulled in the driveway. I too was scared. I know it was a very hot hot day that day. My mom hadn't had time to tend to my wounds, so when she threw a big blanket over me to cover the damage, it caused me to cry. And I was mad because I had to drape myself in a blanket when it was so hot. She just shushed me and said to sit still.

My father came in but I honestly don't remember what occured after that. I just know that no one got in trouble that day. Except maybe that biker, from my brothers, who didn't even make an attempt to avoid hitting me. He just rode like I was a pebble in the road that he could roll right over. I think he flipped over his handlebars but he was ok. He was worried about me mostly.

Written by louie0768 .