January 2013: The Month Without A Journey (Update, and Thoughts, and Thoughts, and...)

I'll start this with an update from my last post:  no progress was made with either my insurance company, or with the PA State Police. At this point, I had spent $800 in car rentals out-of-pocket:  $450 one-way from PA to NY plus 6 days, and then $350 local for a week. In attempting to limit my out-of-pocket expenses, and therefore limit that amount I’d have to eat if the insurance process determined that I was not reimbursable, or limit the amount that I would have to hand over (and pay) a lawyer to try to get reimbursed, I went car-less for two weeks. (From my last post:  Mon 1/7/13, 7AM:  I turned in my car rental. For the sake of managing my cash flow, I decided to not rent another car until it’s absolutely needed. Instead, I have to go out of my comfort zone and ask for help; ask for favors from friends, which I have a hard time doing.) 

By the end of last week, I had gotten to my point of no return:  I couldn’t continue to remain car-less. The weekend before 1/7, I bought three weeks-worth of groceries. At that time, I had hoped this would be resolved.  Each weekend during that stretch, the weather ended up being nice, so I was able to walk two blocks to a 7-11 down the street to pick up small essentials (milk, eggs, etc.) I did get a ride back-and-forth to work; but I also had the bus as an option – lucky for me that the bus option only meant an extra 15 minutes on my commute and only costs $1 one-way. I’ll come back to all of this later…

…anyway, by the end of last week, I had gotten to my point of no return. It was time to accept that fact that I would have to find a way to “eat” the $4,400 difference on my car loan, and have that amount included in any financing on a newer car. My plan:  start at my original dealer, ask for a new 2012 leftover or used 2011 car, and pull out all of the negotiating stops to try to keep my monthly payment the same as I had been paying before. Again, in my mind and in the “general” theory, since this accident wasn’t my fault, I shouldn’t be out anything financially. And to me, that means I should not have a higher monthly payment. But that also means that I am not necessarily entitled to a NEW car, since I had been driving a 2011. SO, it was time to rent another car so I could start wheeling and dealing (pun intended). 

Tue 1/22:  after work, I took a bus to the airport to pick up my rental car. (In my experience, airport-based car rental offices are much better equipped to deal with the rental process and offer much more flexibility, compared to local offices. Since I live only 15 minutes from the airport, I generally rent my cars from the airport.)  I drove from the airport to my original car dealer, where I walked in and put it all on the line. I told the salesperson that basically, I bought my 2011 from them, it was totaled (here’s the picture), I’m fighting with insurance, I want a 2012 for the same monthly payment or less, I have a $4,400 leftover loan balance, I’m eligible for dealer and manufacturer loyalty discounts AND Xerox corporate discount, I have online pricing already reviewed and three other dealers in mind if you can’t come up with something. He said he’d be back in a second, and he came back with a major surprise:  the bank that I had my loan through automatically includes gap insurance in their loans. 

HUH? 

That meant that the $4,400 was no longer an issue. So, to make a long story short, I was able to get a new 2013 Subaru, with a cheaper monthly payment, which I picked up on Friday 1/25. And that sounds like the end of the story. It’s not – although, it is the end of the biggest piece of the story, which I’ll come back to in a second.

That same day, I returned my rental car; another $350 tacked onto the insurance fight.  So, even though we reached the climax of this drama, the epilogue has yet to be written:  how, if, and when, will I be reimbursed the $500 deductible and $1,050 in car rentals that I have paid out-of-pocket?

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BUT…there is a sub-drama to this. There is a whole emotional/mental/psychological side to this, and I’m becoming more and more aware of this in little ways.  I was aware of it the day of the accident, maybe a couple of hours afterwards, when reality started to set in – I wrote about that in my December post “NOT JUST”. But I’ve always found it fascinating to study how the brain, and different people, deals with trauma. The classic, and I’m guilty of this, is to either blindly push forward and try to leave it behind as fast as possible, and/or downplay its significance. I have done both. But there are reminders that will appear, and I have to get used to a new normal. 

For example, naturally friends and family are curious to hear about what happened, and to hear about how things are getting resolved. And most times, I get the statement, “well, you are lucky to be alive.”  Don’t get me wrong, that is completely true, and I am very fortunate. But thinking about feeling lucky to be alive comes with the alternate statement, you’re lucky that you’re not dead. Though no one has actually said that, it is a true statement that pops up in my mind, and when it does, there’s a whole thought and emotional process around my own mortality, and the impacts that has on people and things around me. 

What makes that even worse is that until now, I was relatively stuck inside my four walls – physically. Without a car, I spent two weekends basically stuck at home, except for my walks to-and-from the 7-11. It’s a very interesting concept to be stuck inside your four walls physically while stuck inside your head mentally. There were times that luck didn’t seem so lucky, but more frustrating instead. 

As I said, I have to get used to a new normal. In driving the rental cars, and in driving my new car today, the single biggest thought that has been going through my head is:  how financially brutal would it be if I were to get in yet another accident, even if not my fault? It has made me pause at times. It’s not a fear of driving, and not a fear of other drivers, but the subconscious worry of an accident is not as subconscious as it used to be. In time, it will ease and lessen, but, it’s a new norm. 

I can compare this to when I was mugged at gunpoint four years ago this month. I was walking down a sidewalk with someone, on a Saturday night at 10PM, in a relatively safe neighborhood, when someone approached quickly from behind. I moved aside to let him pass, but instead he reached into my back pants pocket with his right hand, moved to the right side of me, and pointed his gun with his right hand at waist level.  Fortunately for me, my wallet fell in the snow and he didn’t get anything, but I was with someone, and her purse ended up being stolen. Nothing happened to us. The aftermath of that was:  five hours in a police station waiting and answering questions (until 3AM), and then watching my friend have to call to cancel credit cards, phone service, arrange for locks to be changed, which took maybe two full days to totally complete. For about a year afterwards, I would tense up anytime I was walking and someone approached from behind, regardless of where or when or how or even who. Still, to this day, there are times, though not as often, I tense up. \

The aftermath of that was two days, and I still have a new normal from that; a slightly less-trusting normal.  I was never at threat financially, and I never had to drastically change my routine. The aftermath of this was more than a month, including being at threat financially, and I did have to drastically change my routine during that time. I also think that this was much more of a near-death experience than that. And I think, even as I am writing this, that there is going to continue to be some emotional gymnastics that will occur. In my first post, I wrote how the movie-scene of the truck starting to flip over replayed in my mind repeatedly in the first 48 hours.  It maybe does once or twice a week, now. 

I am not one to ask for help. I don’t know why that is. I’m not afraid to ask for help, it’s just that I don’t like to. Maybe I don’t like to admit that it’s necessary. Maybe I feel like I should be able to handle most things. And I have told others, and written about, how it is perfectly OK and necessary to ask for help. During this process, I have had to ask for help. Between my parents, and a handful of friends, I have had to ask for things and favors and time. That is making me dive into the whole concept asking for help. 

There’s a faith component to all of this, too, that I could take in several different directions. First, I’m not “lucky to be alive”, but I’m meant to be alive.  Without going to deep into this (that would be an entire string of separate posts); I don’t believe in luck. Things good and bad happen, and something is meant to be taken from those things either way.  But if I go back to the day of the accident, as I was beginning my drive, and even with the slight weather threat that was there, I believed that I was going to get home safely.  And yes, I did, just not the way I subconsciously pictured. And I used the word subconscious there on purpose, because the belief that I was going to get home safely was a subconscious belief. And there are hundreds of subconscious beliefs that allow us to get through our days every day. And with all of those beliefs, it’s easy to take them for granted. But a lot of things are now illuminated under a different light for me. 

And it’s not like I didn’t grasp the concept of not taking things, or people, for granted. I did. I’ve written several times about being thankful for what you have, not focusing on what you don’t; feeling fortunate for being alive; not sweating the small stuff; taking advantage of every moment; being good to yourself’ believing in yourself, etc. etc.  But through all of this, my brain has been a snow globe that has been shaken violently…thoughts that were resting calmly at the back of my mind are all scattered throughout my brain. And now, I think, I hope, the storm is ending, now that it appears that the worst is behind me.

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I’m not looking for sympathy. I don’t do well with it, anyway. I’m not trying to be over-dramatic or melodramatic. I’m not looking for validation or support or even help. :)  I’m sharing. As with most of my posts, a thought that is shared, that creates something positive in someone else, is a thought well spent. But in addition, writing this post in particular is therapeutic. I can’t decide if I want to stick with the emotional gymnastics metaphor or the mental snow globe, but I’ll use the gymnastics one here:  for me, being able to write out my thoughts into words, whether creatively or structured, is like sticking the landing on a tough emotional gymnastics routine. 

I know this isn’t a perfect 10. If you’ve read my much earlier posts, you know I don’t believe that perfection is truly achievable. I still have work and practice to do in terms of belief and faith and not taking things or people for granted, and not over-thinking and not over-worrying. But I hope, in the specific routine of dealing with this accident, I hope I’ve stuck the landing. 

And if not…try, try again. :)