On September 27th we took leave of trying to get situated into our new winter digs in Mission, TX to do something infinitely more important: Fly to Tucson, Arizona to see our newest Granddaughter for the very first time. Isabela Rain Gordon was born to Joshua and Cristina on June 29th. She checked in at 6 lbs. 6 oz. and 19" long.
We were actually IN Mission, Texas taking our "Pre-Drywall Walk-Through" on the house when she was born. Mommy wanted to hold off until July 7th but Bela was having NO part of that. She came into the world laying down the "I run this place now" card - One has to wonder if/when that will ever change.
THE FOLLOWING ARE OBSERVATIONS BY JIM AND DO NOT REFLECT THE OPINIONS OF IRENE, THE ACTUAL MEDICAL DOCTOR OF THE TWO OF US:
Having kids today is SOOO much different than when we were born or even when our kids were born. Now some doctors tell parents to put the kid in isolation until they are 12 weeks olds to protect them from exposure: "Wait until they get that first battery of shots. " Heck when Josh and Joel (identical twins) were born 6 weeks premature; stayed in the hospital for 3 weeks until they got to 5 lbs. and the moment they got out they were at church the next time the doors were opened. Mary got taken to a museum at 1 week old. You didn't used to worry about having family members and others that were NOT sick holding your baby. Not anymore.
Through much of the 50's and into the 70's infant formulas were standard fare for feeding children because it's "so much better than breast milk - perfectly balanced." Not anymore.
During the same period of time the Caudal Block and Epidural were a girl's best friend. Natural childbirth was a rarity. Not anymore.
OH MY how much bottles have changed in the last 60 years: Glass bottles with nipples that looked like a cow udder nipple gave way to plastic bottles with plastic liners with nipples that looked like a woman's nipple to plastic bottles that look almost like a figure 8 with no liners and nipples that just look goofy to me - bent over in one direction and kinda smashed down.
And Pacifiers (FYI "Dummies" in South Africa) which were all the rage for 30 years to the point that they were pinned on the clothes of some kids that were almost 2 years old have almost gone extinct. NONE of our 6 grandkids has ever had one that I know of.
While we were in Tucson, AZ we rented a car from Hertz and stayed at the Marriott on University of Arizona campus. It was about 20 miles from Josh and Chris' Home over on the far east side of town. Chris' mom, Delia Davidescu, had come over from Romania (Chris is a Romanian by birth, American by choice) to help Chris with the baby. We'd go visit during the day and then head back to our hotel at night. We got in Friday about noon and were going to be leaving at about 2 PM on Monday to head back to Mission and more house moving.
On Monday morning we got together for one last time with the kids. It was decided we would go over to their house at 7:00 AM to have bagels for breakfast. The bagels were great. We left their place about 8 and coming back to the hotel we stopped at Lazydays RV to see what they might have in stock and (once again) prove (and pat ourselves on the back) for the excellent choice we had made in selecting the Tiffin Allegro Bus 45LP.
We left at 9:15 and it was a mere 5 miles to our hotel. An easy drive and gave us 4+ hours to get to the hotel and grab our stuff (which we had already packed) and head to the airport. We were about 3/10 of a mile east of the Kino Parkway exit on the I-10 freeway headed west. Suddenly I see a reddish-brown truck coming UP out of the MEDIAN and heading right for us. I told Irene "This guy is going to hit us." B-A-A-M-M-M!!!! He hit us right in the rear driver's side rear wheel. We were doing 55. Before he hit us he had blindly accelerated up onto the Westbound interstate.
Below is a picture I cropped from Google Earth to show you the terrain of the median. We were in the slow lane of I-10 East (the one at the top).
You can see were the I-10 symbol is. That was our approximate position. You can also see that the median BETWEEN the Westbound (our direction of travel) and the Eastbound lanes is as wide as the 2 lanes and the shoulder on both sides put together. So, it is about 45-50 feet. What you can't see is that the Median has about a 6 foot ravine in it. That's the reason why there is a row of vegetation right down the center of the median - the water flows to the center of it. You also can see if you look closely that there are some fairly good sized rocks and a lot of loose gravel in the median. This combination does NOT make for good traction.
Anyway, this FOOL in the truck assumes that, since he can't SEE anybody on the roadway, there must not be anyone on the roadway, so its a great time to floor it to get up onto the freeway and out of the median (more on that later). The problem with his hypothesis is: Due to the ravine in the median causing his truck's rear end to be 3 feet lower than his front end; his line of sight was such that unless a vehicle was a 16' high truck - he could not have SEEN what was on the roadway.
So, we are smacked in the driver's side rear by a vehicle moving virtually perpendicular to us. QUICK, for all you PHYSICS MAJORS READING THIS BLOG - what happens to our car .... and his truck. We are immediately looking at his truck. Because we are now spinning in a counter-clockwise direction as I attempt to keep control of our vehicle and "keep the sloppy side down" as they used to say in the days of CB radios. We ended up doing a 540ยบ spin and came to a stop on the FAST LANE shoulder facing the wrong way with the driver's side tires on the shoulder and the passenger side tires on the rocky median.
We couldn't see the truck. I assumed with his greater mass (and since we saw him go in FRONT of us (which was really the old "behind us" but we didn't know that yet) that it was a hit and run and he just kept going and got off of the freeway at the Kino Parkway exit which was only about 1/4 mile away.
We were both physically fine (thank you Lord). I called 911 to report a hit-and-run accident about 1/4 mile east of the Kino Parkway exit in the Westbound lanes. I was told by the 911 operator that she would dispatch police to us and in fact that their would be police to us momentarily that would check on us but that they were actually responding to a vehicle that had gone off of the road on the eastbound lanes. She explained that there would be a second police cruiser handle our accident and it "might be a while until they got there."
The first Arizona Highway Patrol unit arrived on its way to the incident on the eastbound lanes. We told them what had occurred. They told us that they were responding to reports of a red pickup truck driving recklessly in the eastbound lanes that had gone off the road and down into the median. They realized it was the same truck.
It ended up that the truck had NOT "hit and run" us. When he hit us he had lost control of the truck and continued toward the top of the picture above. His path took him across the shoulder across the dirt and through ANOTHER ravine; through a fence; through a second ravine and he came to a stop after crashing into the fence which surrounds the Kino Sports Complex (where you can see the baseball/softball diamonds).
Now the police had to take statements and type up an "Exchange of Insurance Information" form. Then they needed to get our car off the shoulder of the interstate. Amazingly, even though our rental car's driver side rear wheel was no longer perpendicular to the ground (it was driven in at the top by the force to the truck hitting it) it was still inflated and drivable .... barely. We could go about 25 mph but no faster. If we hit even the smallest bump in the road the tire "bottomed out" against the wheel well. But we decided to try to make it to the hotel and then to the airport about 6 miles away. Lord be praised we did. He blessed us that day by sparing us from what COULD have been a deadly accident. Thank you, Father.
We made it to the airport 1 hour before our flight was to depart. Thank goodness Tucson International Airport isn't O'Hare or LAX or JFK or Atlanta.
To close, a shout out of thanks to the eyewitness who came to our aid. He had seen the accident from the Kino Parkway Overpass and came to see if we were okay and stayed to give the police his witness statement which corroborated that the red pickup truck had come up out of the median and struck us causing us to spin out. He is the one that actually told us that the truck had crashed through the fences and gone through the ravines and come to a stop as it crashed into the Kino sports complex fencing.
