How Many Lives Do You Have?

Writer's block or blogger's block is not something I panic about.  I know that I will write about something eventually because it is an addiction for me and I am not dependent on income from what I write.  I love how words combine on pages, make nice rhythms or sounds, and paint rudimentary pictures of what I want to express.  When virtual readers join in with remarks or comments, that is the icing on the cake.  Well, this block thing I had was finally broken by death.  Not my death, of course, nor the death of anyone close to me, thankfully,  just several incidents that made death more real than usual.  It got me thinking.

I have been close to dying (in a vague way) several times.  Once when I was about seven(?) I had the mumps.  I got very sick and remember my throat actually swelling shut.  It must not have completely closed because I remember telling my mother that I  couldn't breathe and I remember clearly how frightened I was.  We were poor and did not visit hospitals or doctors needlessly, but this did cause piling brothers and sisters into the car, rushing down the canyon to the nearest village and seeing a doctor who applied cold compresses, gave me some medicine and advice, and I thus I lived!

Another time that I came close to danger and perhaps death (I did say these were vague encounters) was when I was playing alone at about the age of 10 in a big field below the foothills. A man stopped his car on the country road near the field where I had been collecting rocks.  He opened the passenger door and ask me to come over.  I did.  He asked if I would like to go for a ride and as I was wondering why this man was asking this, he tossed some pieces of candy across the car seat beside him.  A major warning light went off in the back of  my head---good survival instincts---and I turned and ran like a gazelle back up the hill toward my house.

Once when I was eighteen and on a first date with a local boy we drove up the canyon to a popular tourist dance hall.  We had both consumed too much beer over the evening and not been able to dance it off before heading home.  While going down the canyon we skidded around a curve and did a complete 360 before coming to the edge of the steep side of the road and were lucky no one was coming either up or down the canyon at that time.  Both of us were suddenly sober realizing we were inches from death as we headed on home.  I never dated the boy again, as I guess we decided we were not the best for each other.

In my early twenties while living on an island in the South Pacific I got food poisoning.  It was a dreadful case and there were no really suitable doctors on this island.  I went for almost a week unable to down much more than a tablespoon of water every now and again.  On the sixth day I actually remember thinking that I wanted to die.  I was tired of this horrible intestinal battle and just wanted to "give up the ghost."  The seventh day I made the turn around as luck would  have it and survived!

In my thirties my husband and I visited a ski place in New Zealand.  We had gone up just for the day and not even planned to ski.  We just wanted to see the scenery and enjoy the lodge.  During mid-day a big snowstorm started to fall.  It was so lovely and heavy and steady that almost all of the skiers came in to wait it out as you needed windshield wipers on goggles if you were heading down on skies.  In the late afternoon we boarded the bus to take us back down to the parking lot at the bottom of the mountain.  I  will never forget that trip as the bus fishtailed from side to side either threatening to dash us against a rock interface or throw us down the side of the mountain.  Even hubby who is pretty carefree said he was going to get off the bus and walk down several times getting louder each time.  We made it without serious incident, but it was really pure luck.

I have had other scares such as getting the early stage of the bends when SCUBA diving, getting caught on a rushing muddy trail during a torrential downpour in a tropical rain forest, being stuck on the canvas of a trimaran in an electrical storm while pregnant, etc. but none of these brought me close to death...injury perhaps..but not death.  All of the above were nothing like being caught in a war or riot or plague outbreak and many were the result of carelessness.  But they affected me enough to remember them clearly.

Please feel free to share in a comment below or link to a more lengthy blog post telling my why you are lucky to still be here!