It keeps cropping up, every now and then.
I take a bite of my lunch, I wake up in the middle of the night, I'm haunted by the ever-present scent of formaldehyde.
What's causing it? I can't say.
But a part of me thinks I'm experiencing some kind of "Jacob's Ladder" syndrome. That is, the fact that I am in reality dead but my spirit refuses to see reality as it is and insists on going on as usual.
Yesterday, while driving home from Port Canaveral along a thin two-lane road the usual afternoon cloudbursts opened up suddenly in front of me as I cruised homeward at about 65 miles per hour. Having no A/C, my windows had been down and I had to quickly flip switches on the driver's side door to bring them up.
As I drove into the wall of water that was the front of the rainstorm, I felt the tires beneath me react to the newly wet asphalt and I slowed to get a better grip. The roadway surface seemed well-designed and adequately drained so that while I had to drop to 60 mph, I could maintain that speed comfortably.
But, suddenly, the road surface changed and there was a layer of water covering the slick asphalt. The car began to hydroplane and I couldn't maintain control of the steering. Luckily there was no on coming traffic, otherwise it would be now, at about 60 mph, head on, that I would have crashed. Instead the car veered across the left side of the road and towards the shoulder. I ran off the road despite my pulling on the steering wheel to the right and plunged into a grassy covered ditch, about 3 feet deep. The velocity of the vehicle propelled it through the ditch and as I watched in utter amazement, the airbags deployed and warning dings sounded.
The car slowed but the inertia sent it flying out of the ditch towards the front yard of a house. The car slid into the back of a pick-up truck parked in front of the house. With the airbags already beginning to deflate from the initial impact with the side of the ditch about half a second before, the car now plowed into the back of the truck with just the seat belts to hold me back.
I watched the front of the car crumple and the truck was pushed a few yards forward by the force of the impact. The various contents in the back of the truck spilled out the now damaged back of it onto the hood of my car and the area just in front of my now stopped car. At the moment of the second impact, all power ceased in the car, the windshield wipers froze in place, the radio went dead, the air bag siren and dashboard warning lights went out. What appeared to be smoke wafted through the car interior and when I inhaled it smelled like a strange mix of burned plastic and, oddly, formaldehyde.
I unlatched myself from the seat belt, opened the door and exited the vehicle. It seems, thankfully, I was not hurt but for the exception of a tiny scratch on my right thumb.
The homeowners exited their house and were screaming about their damaged property, wailing in the rain that they couldn't believe it had happened to them again. Apparently, I was not the first driver to wipe-out in their yard. After a minute or two, they thought to ask if I was okay. I said yes. They called 911.
The paramedics came and I told them I was okay, they let me sign a waiver and left. The police arrived and assessed the scene. They called a tow truck and then I went with the tow truck driver to drop off my dead car in their lot and he drove me home.
But I still smell hints of formaldehyde.
Is it just the olfactory memory of the chemical-like smell of the cornstarch in the airbags, or, is it the new fluid in my blood-drained veins?
I can't tell.
I take a bite of my lunch, I wake up in the middle of the night, I'm haunted by the ever-present scent of formaldehyde.
What's causing it? I can't say.
But a part of me thinks I'm experiencing some kind of "Jacob's Ladder" syndrome. That is, the fact that I am in reality dead but my spirit refuses to see reality as it is and insists on going on as usual.
Yesterday, while driving home from Port Canaveral along a thin two-lane road the usual afternoon cloudbursts opened up suddenly in front of me as I cruised homeward at about 65 miles per hour. Having no A/C, my windows had been down and I had to quickly flip switches on the driver's side door to bring them up.
As I drove into the wall of water that was the front of the rainstorm, I felt the tires beneath me react to the newly wet asphalt and I slowed to get a better grip. The roadway surface seemed well-designed and adequately drained so that while I had to drop to 60 mph, I could maintain that speed comfortably.
But, suddenly, the road surface changed and there was a layer of water covering the slick asphalt. The car began to hydroplane and I couldn't maintain control of the steering. Luckily there was no on coming traffic, otherwise it would be now, at about 60 mph, head on, that I would have crashed. Instead the car veered across the left side of the road and towards the shoulder. I ran off the road despite my pulling on the steering wheel to the right and plunged into a grassy covered ditch, about 3 feet deep. The velocity of the vehicle propelled it through the ditch and as I watched in utter amazement, the airbags deployed and warning dings sounded.
The car slowed but the inertia sent it flying out of the ditch towards the front yard of a house. The car slid into the back of a pick-up truck parked in front of the house. With the airbags already beginning to deflate from the initial impact with the side of the ditch about half a second before, the car now plowed into the back of the truck with just the seat belts to hold me back.
I watched the front of the car crumple and the truck was pushed a few yards forward by the force of the impact. The various contents in the back of the truck spilled out the now damaged back of it onto the hood of my car and the area just in front of my now stopped car. At the moment of the second impact, all power ceased in the car, the windshield wipers froze in place, the radio went dead, the air bag siren and dashboard warning lights went out. What appeared to be smoke wafted through the car interior and when I inhaled it smelled like a strange mix of burned plastic and, oddly, formaldehyde.
I unlatched myself from the seat belt, opened the door and exited the vehicle. It seems, thankfully, I was not hurt but for the exception of a tiny scratch on my right thumb.
The homeowners exited their house and were screaming about their damaged property, wailing in the rain that they couldn't believe it had happened to them again. Apparently, I was not the first driver to wipe-out in their yard. After a minute or two, they thought to ask if I was okay. I said yes. They called 911.
The paramedics came and I told them I was okay, they let me sign a waiver and left. The police arrived and assessed the scene. They called a tow truck and then I went with the tow truck driver to drop off my dead car in their lot and he drove me home.
But I still smell hints of formaldehyde.
Is it just the olfactory memory of the chemical-like smell of the cornstarch in the airbags, or, is it the new fluid in my blood-drained veins?
I can't tell.
