riverman wrote:

"Frederick Burroughs" wrote:

Personally, my life has been perilously close to the edge a few times. The
fact that I'm still here gives me pause. Each incident is like a skin has
been shed from a progressing metamorphosis. Most people I know have stood
at death's door once or twice, but were denied admittance by luck or
attentive guardian angel.



Great idea for a thread! I've been tossing around the idea of a collection
of short vignettes of every time I've almost died...either from being
hammered and not quite getting across the threshold, or taking a random left
turn when later I discover that a right turn would have been fatal. Why not
start a new thread, tell us your 'times I almost died' tale, and lets hear
some skin crawlers from folks.

You go first, I'll be right on your tail :-)


I don't have any stories from on the water. I've been paddling for
less than a year. We did come very close to getting swamped by a
freighter (in Hong Kong) while in a small chartered boat, during a
very violent thunderstorm. But, I don't count that time.

1) There was one instance of clear divine intervention - One of my
first jobs while still young: I was working construction, laying pipe,
ductile iron water pipe. It was saturday morning, raining, wet and
muddy on the job site. No one else was there, being a rainy saturday.
I was down in the ditch working on the 4" pipe, 5' below the surface.
Several sections of the pipe lay uncovered behind me. I was supposed
to attach a valve to the end of the pipe, to keep varmints out. It's a
heavy iron valve, attached to the pipe-end. 4 T-bolts and nuts are
used to tighten a flange and compression gasket to secure the valve
onto the pipe. 3 sets of nuts and bolts go on quick and easy, but the
last nut and bolt are rusted together. No amount of banging and
cussing could get the nut and bolt apart. I stood up and pitched the
bolt out of the ditch, turned, and walked down the pipe to get another
bolt. After 4 or 5 steps I heard a thud as air rushed past me from
behind. I turned back around... Right where I was sitting, just
seconds before... The whole side of the ditch had collapsed. If that
last bolt and nut had not been rusted together... Not a living soul
would've been back on the job site 'til Monday. I searched for the
lucky charm for an hour but never found it.

2) A bunch of friends and I went to Virginia Beach for the weekend.
Sunday afternoon a thunderstorm blows in, so we decide to go back to
the cars and head home. I'm tossing stuff into the side doors of my
van. My girlfriend is already in the passenger side. And, lightning is
hitting everywhere, *real* close. I've got the cooler full of beer in
the back of my van, and an emissary is sent from the other car to grab
some beers for the road. I'm in my cutoffs, soaked by rain and ocean
water, barefoot, holding the door handle of the van.

My friend and I are talking. He's got a bag of peanuts and asks if I
want one. He holds a peanut to my face, and... I'm enveloped in white
light?! A very strong jolt passes through my right side.

The light fades and my friend yells "****! Are you allright, Rick?"

I said, "Yeah, I think so," and began messaging and examining my right
arm, still tingling.

"You just got ****ing hit by lightning! Goddamn!" He said. Then,
everybody in the rear car leaned out and asked the same thing, "Are
you all right, man?!" "Do you wanna go to the hospital?"

"No, I'm ok. I think." I say.

"Are you sure? Goddamn. You just got hit by lightning," they asked,
wanting to make sure I'm ok.

I convince them I was good to go. No need for hospitalization. The
lightning was hitting things, close, spitting blue ozone fire. There
were some quick jabs about starting a religion before we got on the
road home, none the worse for wear.

3+) There was the acute kidney failure, with attending hyperkalemia,
and imminent heart failure, but we won't go into that.

There was another construction near-accident. Everyone thought I was
dead. But, the near-miss left me contemplating my fate for a few
seconds, before I yelled to the others that I was ok.

I was next to a cornfield, taking photographs of a sunset behind the
mountains. My car was parked just before a sharp bend, where the road
goes around a hill. I was on the edge of the road and something went
across my face, inches from it, making a swishing, whistling sound. A
second or two later, I heard the rifle shot.







--
"This president has destroyed the country, the economy,
the relationship with the rest of the world.
He's a monster in the White House. He should resign."

- Hunter S. Thompson, speaking to an antiwar audience in 2003.