Times I Almost Died

A thought occurred to me yesterday after I posted the YouTube clip of Des Bishop singing The House of Pain's Jump Around in Irish. I was reminded of the time I was listening to that song as I made my way into school one morning.

As usual I was running a little late -- about half an hour. I really couldn't help it. I lived in the countryside miles and miles away from the school I was going to. The only way I had of getting to school at the time was by hitch-hiking which isn't a very reliable method of getting somewhere on time.

This particular morning when I finally got a lift into town it was from someone who wasn't going very close to my school. When they dropped me off in town I still had a bit of a walk to go to get to school. Part of my route involved walking across some wasteground.

The ground was rough and uneven and I was listening to The House of Pain on my walkman as I stumbled over it. It was a dark and ugly morning, full of rain and wind. I was pretty much withdrawn into myself as I plodded on across the wasteground listening to my music.

After walking across all the rough ground I then walked several more steps before I realised that the ground surface had changed. I had reached the end of the wasteground and stepped out onto the road. I had walked across one lane before I realised this. As soon as I saw where I was I jumped back to the edge of the road and counted my blessings. Luckily it was after the rush hour and the traffic wasn't as heavy as it would have been an hour or so earlier.

I know this isn't the most dramatic of near-death experiences but it doesn't take much to end a life. A car passing at the wrong time and I’d have been finished, possibly without even realising what had happened.

I can think of another couple of times where similar things have happened. The time I was standing at a street corner waiting to cross the road when a double-decker bus took the corner too sharply and mounted the footpath. I was about four inches away from not having to worry about global warming that time. I exchanged glances with the guy standing beside me and we raised our eyebrows at each other. We both knew that we had been very close to finding out what it's all about.

There was the other time when I was standing at a bus-stop waiting for the bus to work. The bus-stop was beside an office block which was under construction. I was leaning against the wall of this new building when a concrete slab fell from the top of the building (six stories) and slammed into the footpath about twenty feet away from me.

Ok I wasn't in any danger at twenty feet but it was close enough for me! Once again, if that slab had been better aimed I'd have been dead and I wouldn't have known what had happened.

Those are only the times I almost died that I can remember the details of. There was another time when I was almost electrocuted. I can't remember the exact details but I was doing a bit of electrical wiring for a friend and there was some confusion about who'd taken the fuse out. I forget how that went but I remember the mental shock I got when I switched the appliance on after I was finished and realised that power had been flowing through it while I had been tinkering with it. It's funny how I can't remember much of the details of that incident but I suppose by that stage I'd been almost killed in senseless accidents so many times that it was barely worth taking notice of.

Anyway, long story short. Life is precious, you're lucky to be alive and enjoy every minute.

Also, look where you're going, don't stand right up to the edge of the footpath, remember the scaffolding is there for a reason and check the fuses yourself.