Tuesday, May 4, 2021

DRIVE, crash

      I didn't get my driver's license until the age of 22. My father never had any car that was suitable for beginning drivers, so First I got a job and then bought a car, my first car a 1957 Chevrolet Bel Air. I bought it from Colarusso's in Troy, the owner being John Colarusso's father. 

   I don't drive very much any more, but I used to rack up quite a bit of mileage. For a time I drove to work every day in Troy and Delmar and Albany. I drove to  SUNY Albany to complete my Master's Degree; for the final credits, I would drive from my job in Cambridge straight to the Albany campus. I drove on  trips to Cape Cod, Lake Placid, Lake George and other sites. And for 15 years, I scoured the countryside in Cambridge, Salem, Greenwich, Hebron, Argyle and even throughout Rensselaer County, as well as driving to the annual conventions in Syracuse and meetings in Herkimer. And, when single, I drove to places of entertainment at least weekly. And besides ordinary travel for personal and medical care, I drove for a complete year for extensive treatments in less than ideal physical condition. 

   The point is I have driven a lot, in quite a few directions and areas, and I have had only two collisions with me driving.  Oddly enough, both occurred in Stillwater. Neither collision resulted in any physical damage. The cars were the only victims. 

   Accident #1----It was late evening and I was driving my sister to a doctor in Stillwater. She wasn't feeling well so I offered to drive. Unfortunately, the office was closed, so we started home. I stopped at the stop sign at the end of the street before intending to turn right onto Lake Avenue. A large luxury-looking  car came speeding  down the hill. I stopped, and he smacked into my driver's side front fender, kind of a glancing encounter, before stopping his car in the road. We were pretty far back in the side street, so not near his car. I recall he was an attorney returning from some event in Saratoga. We perceived him as both wealthy and inebriated. Neighbors called the police, and while they were standing in the road near his car doing what cops do, another vehicle approached headed up Lake Avenue. That driver, seeing the car stopped in the road, slowed down, but then barreled straight into the front of the car, at a slow but steady rate of speed, and pushed the accident car a distance up the road, police and bystanders and driver all caught by surprise. When that driver emerged from his car, he was visibly intoxicated; he may have been another attorney. I was not issued any citation.  I don't know how it was ever determined which collision caused more damage. I know the Lohnes brothers worked out the details, as they always did,  I was able to drive my car home though it needed parts for sure.

   Accident #2-----Occurred not far from #1.  I had finished a final paper for a summer course, and had driven it to SUNY in my convertible. Mary and Dorothy B. , youngsters at the time, had accompanied me. The radio was playing and we were enjoying the music, until we rounded a small curve which was partially obscured by a large tree. A car was stopped in the middle of the road. I applied the brake, but smacked into the rear of the car. The occupants were a young couple from out of the area who were not sure where they were and were trying to decide which way they wanted to go. She was sitting snuggled next to the driver, as girls did back then, and hit her knee on one of the controls. Dick Lohnes, later dealing with that accident, maintained that if she had been sitting in her own seat, that would not have happened. Anyway, The cop issued me a ticket for "following too close."  That was just a few months after our wedding, and Dave wanted to challenge the ticket. He was successful. It seems the Stillwater Town Justice was quite intrigued by Dave. He agreed the car should not have been stopped on the highway and that the tree would have obscured their car from being seen from a following vehicle. The last I knew, Dick Lohnes was also in debate with the other insurance company.

   

   

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