This summer, on July 23rd, I was in a very excruciating car accident. My family and I were almost to the lake we go to every year as a sort of “family reunion,” at Bass Lake, California. Bass Lake is a beautiful, blue, and huge lake that we spend time at for a few days every year. It is about eight hours from our house, and we were about an hour out from our destination when the unimaginable happened. My dad had chosen to take a different route this year since we didn’t have our boat with us. We were disappointed that our boat was not working well enough to come with us, until we later realized that not having our boat had saved our lives. My family and I were all extremely cheerful. We had just received slurpees from 7-11, and we were stoked to reunite with everyone. Who knew how fast our world could collapse in a matter of seconds. “Why is my mom screaming,” I remember thinking, only to realize why as soon as I looked up. A car was turning directly in front of us, going 60 mph. This caused a head on collision, and since we were on the right side of the road, our truck got forced down into this 75 foot “drop”. This is the part where if we would of had our boat attached to the back of us, we would have rolled. My family and I would have rolled so many times. I always refer to it as “angels surrounding us” as we went down that drop. Somehow we managed to receive the tiniest amount of luck at that moment. 

  “Thank the world,” I thought as we got out of the truck and were standing devastated and confused at the bottom of the hill. Somehow I managed to zone all of the screaming out for a second. Many people had pulled over and were yelling to us from the top of the hill. Everything was okay for a second until I realized I was hurt.

“I think I hit my head”, I said to my mom as she wiped her black, perfect hair out of her eyes. 

  “Lay down right where you are and don’t move!” was the response I received from my mom along with a little shake in her voice. The clouds in the sky seemed to be dancing around as I layed at the bottom of the hill. I then realized that I had gotten out of the truck so fast, getting my shoes didn’t even cross my mind.

  “911 is on the way,” yelled down several people standing above

 “OW, I think I hit my head harder than It seemed,” I thought blankly to myself.

 “ Do you guys need us to come down there? Talk to us!”  someone else yelled from above  

 “NO, just get help for my daughter,” my dad yelled back up, frightened  I was so uncomfortable laying down because I was laying in a bunch of goat heads. They didn’t even hurt me, though, because I was too shaken up to even notice. The was just setting behind the tree that I faced, which was somewhat calming to me. Soon enough, my family and I heard sirens coming from a distance  “Is everyone okay? Who is hurt?” yelled the paramedics while running down the hill  “We are fine, just help my daughter!” my dad replied to them a little more frustrated this time. Before I even had time to move my head, I already had a full body brace on and was being asked a million questions.  “Dang, how many times do they need to ask me when my birthday is,” I thought to myself. Who knows how many different times I was told to not move, but I listened  “Now let us do all the work, you’re going to be rolled onto a stretcher,” was the last order I received from the rescue workers. Trusting seven grown men to carry yourself up a hill is not as easy as it sounds   I did smile a little bit when I heard my brother yell up to me, “ McKenna your phone is okay!” That made me burst into tears, realizing that my family was okay., knowing that they easily couldn’t of been okay

  Once I was settled down in the ambulance, the skinny tall blonde guy who was with me took a picture of my head and showed me. It literally looked like there was a dent between my forehead and left eye. Then there were three big circular cuts on the left side of my face. I was wearing a Denver Broncos shirt that my sister had gotten me, which the paramedic kept trying to make conversation about by talking about the football team. I was already well distracted though by examining every medical item in the ambulance.  As I layed there, terrified, I thought, “How does all of this even happen in such little time?” I was okay with the guy in the ambulance for a second until he tried putting an IV in me. Let’s just say he, never brought another needle near me that night. I screamed so loud until the veins sunk back into my arms. The guy had my mom sign a refusal form for me, and then I glared at him for the rest of the way   “Who does he think he is?” I thought, annoyed. When we arrived at the hospital, I was taken to a room and moved into a different bed. The hospital I was sent to was extremely small, and I could tell they were excited to have an emergency room patient. “If only I could get rid of these goat heads and this tight neck brace!” was a constant thought for me. Eventually I got to change my clothes. I felt much better. After my mom and I waited for what seemed like forever, I got taken to the CT room, which stood for Cat Skan . My head was examined for any internal bleeding or damage. Luckily, the only damage done was the visible marks on my head. Hours later, I finally got released from the hospital. My uncle had driven to the hospital from the cabin to come get us. Getting back into a vehicle was not easy for me.

 This whole devastating nightmare taught me endless lessons about life. Realizing I could go from being so happy with my family to being rushed to the hospital in a matter of seconds was a real eye-opener for me. The injuries on my face were temporary, but the memory of a car coming at me going full speed will never venture out of my head.