Whenever I am given a writing assignment in school I am always told to avoid clichés. I should not say things like "my life flashed before my eyes" or "as big as an elephant." I am supposed to be more creative in what I am saying and how I am presenting myself in the assignment. I, typically, do not have a hard time steering clear of clichés, but recently I was involved in something that made me realize that sometimes it is okay to use clichés because you have no other words to describe what has happened to you.
On March 12, 2017 I was driving home from Minnesota United's first home match as a Major League Soccer team at TCF Bank Stadium in the Twin Cities. The day had been great. I had some great father-daughter time with my dad, something I do not get to do much after leaving for college. We met up with some old friends and watched our team get destroyed (it's their first season in the MLS - cut them some slack). And then we walked back to our car happy that we got to experience such a milestone for sports in Minnesota.
The entire time we were enjoying ourselves it was snowing. And by snowing I mean, snowing. There was at least an inch of snow on the soccer field and much more piled elsewhere. My parents were concerned about the snow prior to the game but I made it clear that I wanted to go to this game no matter what. As we were driving to get my car the snow did not seem much worse than anything I had driven in before. Just constant snow, not too heavy, not too wet. So as I said goodbye to my dad and pulled out of my parking spot I was feeling good. I would be back on campus in less than an hour.
Boy, was I wrong! Not fifteen minutes into my drive a car in front of me slammed on their brakes so naturally, I slowed down. I was only going 35ish on the freeway to begin with, but as soon as I stepped on the brakes I could tell the last thing I would be doing was stopping.
My car spun out across all four lanes of traffic and I ended up backward facing oncoming traffic with a car coming straight for me. I braced myself for the impact but did not close my eyes for whatever reason. This is when the cliches began. As soon as I felt the first hit I saw my life flash before my eyes. I had never been in a situation that this saying would be used, but as soon as I was sitting backward I knew what people meant when they said it. Everything important I had done was running through my mind, everything I wanted to do with my life bombarded my brain. In the back of my mind, I knew that I was going to make it out the accident - I just had a gut feeling - but this did not stop my brain from playing the "what-if" game. As soon as my car came to a stop, this time sideways in the middle of the freeway, I began to sob. I do not know if I would classify this accident as a near-death experience (my airbags did not even go off), but it really shakes one up to experience something that makes a cliche come to life.
Soon after my life flashed before my eyes I started to think about how lucky I was that I was okay, even if my car was not. I now understood why people were so adamant about counting one's blessings and appreciating everything one has in life. It is because you never know when something is going to happen to you. You never know when you will be spinning around in the middle of a freeway. This accident really made me realize that life is short; I have to pursue it. Take some advice from me: avoid the accident and start living life to the fullest right now. Clichés and all.
