Chapter content
Almost two years after the major motorcycle accident, I was working again. Life was getting back to normal, although I was using a wooden walking cane for my left leg. While driving a forklift at work, my name came over the intercom, calling me to the office.
It was my significant other calling to tell me that my dad had died during the night. I was more than stunned. As I drove back to my parents’ home, it was the longest, emptiest ride of my life. I had just lost my best friend and only confidant.
Everyone in our immediate family gathered that day. My brothers and I sat at the kitchen table, drinking beer and feeling sorry for ourselves, when our brother Pat walked in.
Seeing how upset we were, he said, “Why don’t we just be grateful for the time we had with him?” That statement made me angry at the time, but I still carry it with me today.
May 6
Two months later, we were still grieving our dad’s death. He had been our rock and foundation. We were not the only ones suffering; everyone who knew him felt the loss deeply.
My brothers and I were preparing our mother’s home and property for auction. I had come from work to help begin the process. Very few words were spoken because of the pain we were all feeling.
Then my oldest brother, Bill, reached into his car, pulled out two beers, and handed me one.
My significant other, sitting on the back porch, saw this. She quickly gathered our two five-year-old children and went home as soon as she realized the drinking had begun.
We started working, but we did not slow down our drinking. One beer turned into another. The more we drank, the more intense the pain became.
As the evening went on, we decided to go to a nearby bar to play pool and drown our sorrows.
After years of drinking together, I did not realize that Bill’s tolerance for alcohol had changed drastically. He could no longer handle the amount he once could.
Bill insisted on driving that night, and I gave in.
Near midnight, we decided it would be meaningful to visit our dad’s grave and pour out a beer in his honor.
As we drove toward the cemetery, our future brother-in-law, Gary, squeezed into the middle seat in the front.
The last thing I remember seeing with my physical eyes was a nuclear power plant at the end of the road in upstate New York.
Bill turned onto a road along the lake and began picking up speed as we went downhill. At the bottom was a curve with a telephone pole nearby.
The car struck the ditch and then slammed into the pole on the passenger side. It began tumbling end over end. The small 1969 Datsun crumpled like aluminum foil.
Bill and Gary managed to get out. Bill was unhurt, but Gary had both ankles broken. My legs were also shattered.
They tried to get me out, but I was trapped. It took firefighters two hours using the “Jaws of Life” to free me.
What they did not realize was that the car battery had broken loose and spilled acid onto my face.
I remember the sensation of the acid and the burning in my eyes. I could not move my arms to wipe them. I was in shock and do not recall feeling the full extent of the pain.
The acid severely damaged my eyes and burned my face. I later learned that no saline solution was available in the ambulance, so my eyes were not treated until I reached the hospital more than two hours later.
Both of my legs were shattered, and my hip was torn from its socket. At one point, the doctor tried repeatedly to pull my leg back into place, unaware that the hip was actually sheared off. The pain was intense.
Eventually, X-rays revealed the true injury, and surgery was performed to repair my hip with screws. My legs were placed in casts without being set due to the severity of my eye injuries.
When I became fully aware of my condition, I had very little vision, both legs in traction, and a freshly repaired hip.
My brother Bill came into my room and said, “Dan, I don’t know what to say.”
I responded without hesitation, “Bill, this isn’t your fault. This is alcoholism.”
He carried guilt for many years afterward.
Then he said something that stayed with me forever: “Dan, I spoke to a doctor. I’m going to give you one of my eyes.”
I told him he could not do that. I could not imagine him losing his sight because of me.
Doctors attempted to save my vision by applying a hardened protective layer over my eyes. It remained there for a month.
It was one of the most painful periods of my life. Every blink caused intense pain.
A Different Perspective
My ex-wife has been through a lot in life and played a huge part in my recovery, for which I am grateful. Here is her perspective of what happened the day of the accident, from what she had told me. She called it a tragedy.
She said, “I remember sitting on the back porch watching Dan and his brother clean up their mother's backyard.
I could tell they were not enjoying it very much, and I remember watching his brother go to his car to get something out of it. When he turned around, there were two bottles of beer.
Right then, I knew that once the drinking started, it was going to last most of the night. I decided it was time to take our small children home.”
Then she said, “The phone rang around 2 A.M., and it was Gail.” She is Bill’s wife. Gail said, "The guys have been in a car accident. I will be right there to pick you up. Have the kids ready. We'll drop them off at Mom's."
Then Ann said, “My first feeling was anger. How could he do this to us again? We had all been through this just two years ago when he was in a motorcycle accident. He had been drinking then, too.”
She then told me that she had cried her heart out for me, and she had no tears left. Not this time!
She then described to me the scene at the hospital when she arrived with Gail.
“The emergency room was not terribly busy that night. Dan was in there somewhere, but I was not allowed to see him until the doctors finished examining him.
I remember his brother Bill pacing back and forth with a look of shock on his face. Everyone tried to tell me what they all thought had happened. No one was sure, just that they missed a curve, hit a telephone pole, and ended upside down.
Dan's face was in the windshield, and the battery acid poured down his face into his eyes. They did not know if he would ever see again.
I can remember the long walk to the other end of the emergency room. There were nurses and doctors everywhere. Each time I passed a cubicle, I checked to see if it was Dan.
It was not until I got to the very end of the hall that I saw Dan lying on a bed, rolling around in shock. I was grateful that he was not sober enough to feel the pain his body was in.
Then I moved a little closer so I could see his eyes. I will never forget his eyes. They were gray and all foamy looking. The white was no longer white. The green pupils were no longer there; I just saw gray where his eyes used to be.
In time, the doctors were able to fix his broken hip and his legs, although they never healed back to the way they were.
The next day, his eyes began to leak fluid, and they sent a specialist over to put glue on them. I can remember how strange we all thought it was to use glue on a person’s eyes. This was only the beginning of many attempts to save Dan's eyes, all of which were failures.”
I do not blame Ann for her feelings in this above writing, for she has been through so much in life.
Nevertheless, I am so grateful to her for her sacrifice of being a caretaker for my son and myself.
Even though we could no longer live together, I consider her one of my teachers and an angel in this segment of my life.
So, thank you Ann.