the morning

So, yesterday started with a bang.

I was on my way to work, enjoying my lovely morning bicycle commute. I was going down a street that connects to the bicycle path that takes me most of the way to the college when I noticed some traffic conjestion a few yards ahead.

I'm harumphing in my head because a car has pulled into the bike lane in front of me, and as I work out my strategy for getting around the car and onto the bike path, I realize something is awry.

Looking to the other side of the street, that's when I saw him. A person lying motionless in the bicycle lane, a toppled bicycle a few feet beside them.

Ah, I put it together. There's been an accident - most likely a bicyclist hit by a car. I stopped, dismounted, and headed over to the motionless person.

It was eerie to me the way he wasn't moving, but his eyes were wide wide open, not looking at anything in particular. As I got closer, a rather distraught woman tells me, "I hit him... I didn't see him..."

She goes on about her baby in the car and is clearly agitated. Other witnesses have called 9-1-1, so I lean down to the injured cyclist. There's blood streaked across his face, a small pool of blood on the pavement, and he has a deep deep wound right to the outside of his left wide-open eye.

"It's okay", I say. "You're gonna be all right". I could be totally full of sh*t, but it seems like the thing I should say to him.

"Where does it hurt?", I ask, really just wondering if he can respond. In a slothlike fashion, he raises one arm  so his hand is toward his head. He has yet to say anything. I'm somewhat relieved to see he can move a limb.

"What is your name?", my next quiz. 

A rather slurred "Alex" comes out, just slightly above a whisper.

To be continued... 

...because I have to go to work. But I wanted to start to blog this down because I felt weird the whole day yesterday afterward.

Bottom line: WEAR A HELMET and stop at sketchy intersections.