Oops! Did I do that?!?!

Ok, so thinking about all the times I've screwed up in my life has been so much fun. Really. I just love to think about what an idiot I tend to be at times... ; )

My favorite (is that possible? to have a favorite?) "Oops!" moment happened the Sunday after 9/11. That would have made the date September 16th. I was scheduled to sing at church that Sunday morning. We were staying down at our river house on the Altamaha River, and we had a 30 minute drive across the county to church. I was scheduled to sing that morning, and I wanted to get there even earlier than usual to practice. Mama and I were rushing to get out of the house, and I was still trying to decide what to sing and what shoes went best with my dress! I finally decided on my new brown leather stacked sandals. They were so cute... they had cutouts of flowers and designs all on the top part of the shoe. Totally not in fashion now, but they were the bomb back then. So, I was still not used to the stacked nature of the sandals since they were so new! We get in the car - for some reason we drove my car and not mom's, and we start out. I make it maybe 100 yards from the house and all of the sudden my foot is twisted up under my gas pedal/brake. I look down for a split second... The next thing I hear is a loud CRUNCH! And a WHOOSH! And then this thick powdery stuff starts billowing out into the car. I hit a TREE. A stationary, 300 year old tree. And while I was only going about 15 mph, the impact was enough to deflate my airbags. Mama practically screamed at me trying to make sure I was ok. I remember getting out of the car in what seemed like slow motion and realizing what had happened... and I remember Mama screaming just standing there crying. We were literally burning from the air bag powder, the seatbelt left abrasions on our chests, and we were shaking from shock. It was so surreal. We walked back to the house, Mama called Daddy to tell him what had happened. He was already at church, so he told Jonathan (our music director) that I wouldn't be there to sing, and he headed home to us. All the while, my car horn was piercing the still, morning air. When I crunched in the front end, somehow the horn got jammed. So, it was going off for what seemed like hours until Daddy got there and clipped some wires to make it stop.

And while it may seem like not a big deal, I can't even begin to tell you how that one "Oops!" incident affected my mother and me. It was an extremely rough week for us. Six days earlier was the tragedy of 9/11. I spent the majority of that day in limbo. I didn't know whether I was going to lose one uncle or two. One was in Gainsville, FL, hospitalized after a major heart attack. The other was in the Pentagon at work that day - and we didn't know whether or not he was alive or dead.

That week turned out to be rather traumatic for my family... my uncle who was in the hospital did pass away, my uncle who was at work in the Pentagon on 9/11 was alive but suffering from PTSD, and my stacked sandals caused my mom and I to have a complete emotional breakdown and caused my wallet to get lighter by a few thousand dollars.