A Friend Gets Hit

Around lunchtime I drafted a witty blog that thanked a man who told me to slow down on an icy bridge on the Mount Vernon Trail. And if all had gone well I would have added to it by writing about seeing Chris from the Friday Coffee Club and having another rider ask to draft me while he caught his breath on the way home. During mid afternoon, that all went in the dumper.


This blog pretty much exists because my friend Charmaine kept urging me to convert the emails I was sending her about my bike exploits to a blog. Charmaine has two blogs herself, Living Car-Free! and Bicycling to Work. She is a very experienced cyclists; she's done the cross country thing and has been bike commuting forever. I met her several years ago on the 50 States Ride at an intersection on MLK Avenue in Anacostia. Her friend Keith was on a beam bike, she was on a Bike Friday and I was on Big Nellie. We were on the Avenue of Misfit Bikes. Long story short, she lived a mile from my house in Mount Vernon. We ended up doing scores of rides together.

Some years ago she introduced me to Reba who also bike commutes to DC from my neck of the woods. Reba emailed me this afternoon to tell me that, yesterday, Charmaine was struck head on by a pick up truck while riding to work on Michigan Avenue in DC.  Skipping over the details, the pick up truck won.

She's in the hospital with a bunch of injuries (broken right arm, contusions, scrapes, concussion, etc.) that one would expect to get from such a collision. She expects to get out of the hospital but she'll have to do rehab (to learn to use her left hand) and physical therapy.

I went to see her tonight. She looks pretty good all things considered and was lucid.

Just a few minutes before Reba's emaiil, I learned that a colleague of mine fell in a Metro station today. She did a face plant and was taken to the ER.

I am starting to get paranoid.

Tomorrow is another day. Maybe I'll stay in bed.