When I about 12 years old, I got a twelve speed bicycle as a birthday present. One day I decided to take a ride around the town and followed the pavement to the business district, as I crossed the road, I saw what looked like more pavement and started to follow it as it narrowed and twisted. What I did not know was this was a drainage ditch and before I could process things, I went careening down an embankment towards a heavily travelled high speed expressway.
As this was happening, my whole life was passing before my eyes with the realization that I was surely going to die. As my bicycle sped downward towards the road, I applied the breaks which I found did not work. Next thing I knew, I went sailing over about a 4 foot embankment onto the road and I thought sure death as I assumed a car speeding down the two lane road would kill me instantly.
There was a wooden median that separated the two sides of the road and I thought, "Now for sure I am dead because even though a car did not kill me, I will not be able to get through the wood median, but I saw a gap in the median and sped through it just to understand that I would definitely be killed by a car coming from the opposite lane.
When that did not happen I assumed that the parking lot gate across the road would be closed, which it normally was and that I would smash into it at full speed and die, but the gate was open and the parking lot empty and I sped into the vacant parking lot jubilantly thinking, "I am going to live!"
At that poing, my bicycle crashed full force into the opposite gate and I slid down the fence like a cartoon pancake and my bicycle went flying. Aside from some scratches and bruises on my knees and arms, I was ok.
When I got home, I made sure I went to the bicycle store to get the brakes fixed. I should have just thrown away the bicycle as it was almost like I was trying to kill myself when I think of all the dangerous situations I got involved in with that bike. Yet somehow, I survived.
I have included a satellite photo of the location where this happened and you can see the median as well as the two lane road and the parking lot across the street. The photo does no justice to the terror of being there and the memory I carry around of that incident.
https://satellites.pro/USA_map#40.805542,-74.191890,19
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