Motorcycles and Road Pizza

I have received numerous emails from regular readers asking me why I don’t write about poker anymore. To tell you the truth, it has nothing to do with poker. I simply haven’t been able to write about anything lately. But I wanted to post this and let you take from it what you wished. In the end, I simply wanted you to understand what happened, and what the future holds.

It’s taken me nearly two and a half months to write this, but I’m going to give it a go. The delay has been for many reasons. To begin with, it was because of pure pain. I couldn’t type with a shattered shoulder and dislocated fingers. But even more than that, there was the mental aspect. Simply thinking about what happened was difficult enough. Actually discussing it was out of the question. But here we are, well into December, and it is time to stop worrying and start writing.

On September 23rd, at around 11:30 at night, I was riding my motorcycle home after a wonderful evening out. I had spent the evening out with someone I truly cared for, and had not a care in the world. I had ridden the route a thousand times; in both daylight and at night. It was on Colorado 83, a two lane road with little traffic, and a 65 MPH speed limit, which I was obeying.

One little amazing fact about this night was when I left to go home, it was cold. So for the first time in over a year I decided to put on all my leather and my helmet. I hated that helmet, so I never wore it. But on this one night, because of the weather, I decided to ignore my hatred, and wear it.

As I got to within 5 miles of my house, my entire life changed in just a matter of seconds. I was approaching a curve to my left, and saw a car coming the other way. Of course, my lean into the turn put my head towards the car coming the other way; but even worse, I noticed the car had drifted into my lane. I stood my bike up to try and clear the car, and in doing so straightened out my bike on a curve. Adding more problems, the curve had a negative banking for my purposes (but probably great for drainage). Add all of this together, and my front tire was headed for the side of the road, and a 13 foot drop into a ditch.

I hit the brakes hard, and tried my best to keep from going into the ditch. I thought I had it under control, but I simply couldn’t keep the front tire on the pavement. When the rear tire left the pavement, I was in trouble. Still going at least 50 MPH and braking on grass, on the edge of a ditch….I think you can figure out the rest of the story.

When the rear tire finally slipped into the ditch, my only thought was “I’m dead”. That’s it. And it’s the last thing I remember before waking up in the ditch, sore, disoriented, and wondering if I was going to live. I was freezing lying there too. It was around 35 degrees, but my fear was that I had always heard dying people are cold. After doing a full inventory of moving parts, I noticed that a few cars had gone by without stopping. I guess down in the ditch wasn’t the best way to be seen. So I tried to crawl up towards the sound of the cars. That’s when I noticed that I couldn’t feel my left foot. In my mind, it was gone.

I then reached into my back left pocket for my cell phone, with my left hand. Amazing part #2. I got it out, and amazingly enough, it worked. It was amazing for two reasons. One, because I was in the middle of nowhere and I rarely got a signal there. Two, if you followed the accident description, I obviously landed on my left side during the accident. I got the phone in front of my helmet, took off my glove with my teeth, and managed to his the phone button. This brought up the last number I had called, and it just happened to be Valerie, my wife. We were in the process of separating, but amazing enough she was only 5 miles away at the house.

She answered, and all she heard was “Help”. She immediately asked what was wrong, and all I could answer was “wrecked the motorcycle”. She asked where I was, and I croaked out “curve just south of the school”. Somehow that was enough, because she knew exactly where I was and told me to lay still and she was calling 911.

So I hung up, and started waving the phone at any passing cars. There were only three or four. I had to wave it with my right hand though, because suddenly my left arm wasn’t working anymore. The shoulder was hurting, and I was unable to move it.
I then heard a car backing up, and knew someone had seen me. Turns out she had seen the reflection of my motorcycle, but the reason didn’t matter. Human help had arrived.

A woman got out of her SUV, saw me, and yelled “Oh my God, are you ok?”

All I could answer was “I’m freezing, do you have a blanket?”

She replied “Of course. I’m a nurse, I’ll be right down”.

Really, the only car to stop is a nurse. Amazing part #3.

So the nurse is helping me, and I hear a car brake hard and turn around. There was no doubt in my mind that it was Valerie. She made good time.

Then I hear the ambulance pull up, and I start to honestly feel, for the first time, that I am going to live. People don’t normally survive what had just happened to me, so I am lying on the ground in amazement, shock, and just complete confusion.
It turned out that my left foot was intact, but had been caught by the gear shifter and was pointing behind me. Not broken, but severely separated. They were able to knock me out in the hospital, and put it back in its proper place.

My left shoulder was an entirely different story. I had landed hard on it, and it was shattered. The ball of the shoulder had broken off of the humorous and broken into three pieces. How I got my phone out of my pocket is still an incredible wonder to me.

My left elbow hit the ground, followed my left ribcage, causing a separation of two of my ribs, and in perfect alignment, a severely bruised spleen.

The initial impact drove my left hand (still holding the handlebars) into the ground, separating the knuckles. Again, no breaks. Breaks wouldn’t have been nearly as painful.

Then momentum and gravity brought my right hand, still holding the handlebars, over the top, separating the knuckles of them on impact.

I then landed hard on my left hip. So hard, in fact, that I still have no feeling in it. That's why the cell phone working was such a big deal. Why didn't it brake when I landed on it? The key ring in my right pocket shattered from some of the impact, but the cell phone worked beautifully.

And of course, momentum and gravity still being controlling factors in this world, the entire impact drove my face into the dirt. Like I wrote earlier, a little miracle that I had decided to wear a helmet that night.

I then proceeded to roll about 50 feet, and the scrapes and scars on my helmet will attest to the fact that the helmet absolutely saved my life that night. I did have minor road rash on my left side, but without all the leather it would have been much worse too.

Even with the separated ankle, I was up and walking (with the aid of an amazing walking boot) just two days later. In fact, I walked out of the hospital four days later.

A week later I went to see a shoulder specialist. They had to wait until the swelling went down, so there was great concern that the bone would not heal properly, having been separated from the blood supply for so long. I can tell you with 100% certainty though, that this is not the case. New x-rays show that the surgery to repair it was incredibly successful, and the blood supply is flowing beautifully. I do have a really pretty titanium bar and three screws in the shoulder, holding it all together, but overall I am very happy with the results.

In the end, I am very happy, and feel very blessed after all is said and done. I am nowhere near fully recovered. The shoulder itself will take another six months at least. The mental aspects could take years. But I am alive and breathing, so everything else at this point is pure gravy.

I am also very blessed to have people in my life that have been there for me.

We can start with Valerie right after the accident.

Then there are my two sons, mother and sister checking up on me regularly since the accident.

Throughout the whole ordeal, my friends were constantly checking on me to see what they could do to help.

Finally we end with Christa at the house to care for me every day after I got home. What else could a man ask for? I am truly blessed.

So there you have it, the real reason I stopped writing about poker a few months ago. Hopefully when I am fully recovered, I can take up writing again. I hope you are there to read it.