I feel so.... mortal.

Two weeks ago, on Labor Day, my family and another family decided to spend the day at the lake. The lake that is in our backyard is getting a little low, so we decided to try another lake that is about an hour from our home. It is a little out of the way and not very crowded. The water is clear and cold, there are bridges to jump from and turtles to play with. It sounded nice and we decided to head out.

The drive to the lake was very windy and on tiny roads with big rock walls on both sides or cliffs on the sides. We drove our big 10 passenger van and we were towing our boat. So, we weren't going super fast on these small, windy roads. A group of people on motorcycles came up behind us. They all started passing us, even though we were about to turn a corner that we could not see around because of the big rock walls. Travis and I were horrified that they were going to fast and passing on a double yellow! Travis tried to pull over to the side of the road as much as he could as they finished passing.

As we rounded the next corner a lady came running toward us, franticly waving her arms and yelling for us to stop. As we slowed down and rounded the corner we saw the reason why. One of the motorcylists had run head-on into a motorhome. He was laying on the ground. There was a lot of blood. Travis stopped the van and immediately jumped out and ran to the man. The lady from the motorhome had dialed 9-1-1 and was on the line with them.

I will spare you the gory details, and they are very gory. It was a tramatic event. We grabbed our kids spare clothing and we tried to stop his bleeding. Travis did CPR for close to 40 minutes with some other men who had arrived on scene after we did. The man was badly injured. Our kids were in the van praying. The police had a hard time locating a signal and could not find us... finally someone who was waiting in the long line of cars that had started to form, drove home and called 9-1-1 from a land line so that they could locate where we were. It took the life flight helicopter almost an hour to reach us. The paramedics arrived at the same time as life flight. It was surreal. After all Travis's hard work and all our time, after working on the man for another 20 minutes or so, the doctor called it. It was over. I cried. The kids cried. We talked about what had happened, why it happened, why the prayer was not answered the way we wanted it to be.... The kids still talk about it. Livie still talks about her "friend" who had to go to the doctor to be fixed- she doesn't understand- but she could see how bad it was.

I had debated whether or not to post this. I decided that this is something that I want to remember. I have never been with someone as they died. I have never been a part of a rescue operation like that before. It was scary. I think that the reason that I want to remember it is because Travis and I have both been changed from being there. We both keep thinking about how this man passed us on his motorcycle and 30 seconds later he was laying on the ground dying. I know that Travis and I keep trying to make memories with our kids, more that we used to. Bed times aren't so strict. Reading and cuddling for a few more minutes is important. HAving a clean house, not so terribly important. throwing pillows all over the living room and jumping on the them is more important. It's the little things that these kids are going to remember and if it is all over tomorrow, what do I want them to remember? do I want them to remember that our laundry was put away and closets were organized? (yes, I do), but more importantly, I want them to remember that I put the laundry off until later so that I could jump on the trampoline with them, because that is more important!!

I don't know, I don't want to say I am depressed, but I almost feel that way. I feel like I am looking at life through a magnifying glass. Travis and I had a trip planned to Italy in October. 10 days of Italy! Last week we decided to cancel it. We just want to spend time with our family.