The passenger

Most of the time, I find that it happens when I'm in the car. First, I notice my heart beat start to accelerate, then my chest drops into my stomach and I instinctively clutch my belly as if to hold in all of my internal organs in case they shoot out of my body. The headache comes next, slowly but surely. I can feel it in my entire face, spreading and pulsing until I'm hot and sweaty and it hurts to swallow. My hands are clammy. My eyes and ears are alert, waiting. Then the thoughts come.

Its around this point that I begin to remember a story my mother told me when I was 15 about when she used to be the editor for the local newspaper in the town I grew up in.

There was a fatal car accident involving four teens who were drunk after a school event. I can't remember the exact details of the accident but the driver lost control of the vehicle and slammed into a telephone pole. Everyone in the car died instantly. My mother went to the scene of the accident and arrived shortly before bodies were removed from the vehicle. She said it was so bad that nothing could be salvaged, something about there only being eyeballs left.

Maybe this was imagined in my 15 year old mind, perhaps it was a factual detail. Perhaps my mother sensationalized the story. Perhaps. I think she told me this story to discourage me from riding/driving in a car drunk. I didn't actually need encouragement at the time, but nonetheless, the story did its job, I was scarred by its telling and have been extremely sensitive about car accidents ever since. I can't even look at footage of them without cringing. I become extremely uncomfortable at the mere thought of them. It is the worst possible way I can think of dying.

My hands are clammy. My eyes and ears are alert, waiting. Thoughts.

I glance over at him, the one I trust the most, driving, looking ahead on the freeway, ocassionally drifting in and out of different topics while I half listen, half practice that meditative breathing thing my counselor recommended. Its not working (it never does) so I start the routine trio of glancing to the spedometer, then to freeway ahead, then to him driving.

Eyeballs. Telephone pole. Slamming. My hands grip knees. My heart beating like a hammer.

Everything is a blur as I squeeze my eyes shut and talk myself down. I'm so used to it by now that I might as well give up and ride the wave. I always do. I can't win.

I was scarred by its telling.