Alpine Calamity

Preface:
I found this in an email. I wrote this for an English course in high school. I don't remember the prompt. It is the story of my bike accident in Germany.

___________________________________________

Alpine Calamity

I don’t remember much. It all seems like a distant dream, one that should have awakened me with a jolt. But this was different. It lacked certain dream qualities; the fall was too quick, my stomach didn’t have that light-as-air feeling and I did not instantly wake up.  I vaguely remember being lifted. I managed to mutter a mere “ow” only to let my barer know that I was conscious, though I didn’t actually feel any pain. I didn’t feel anything. Then, my head was lying on my mother’s lap and she was stroking my hair until the ambulance came and lifted me onto the stretcher. I recall my mother asking for scissors because she finally had the chance to cut off the hair-ties I always had around my wrist. I remember ironically singing one line from Stay Awake by All Time Low—stay awake get a grip and get out your safe—over and over again in my head. I wasn’t scared.  As a matter of fact, I felt very safe and content. I was more worried about the two hair-ties that my mom just destroyed than about what was actually wrong with me, I wasn't even sure what had happened.
 
The hospital is just one blur. I took some X-rays, and my friend’s mom translated all the German for my parents, informing them that I should be woken every two hours to make sure my concussion didn’t worsen. Before we left the hospital the doctors patched up the huge scrapes that covered my arm and lower back. I was also given a brace to readjust my clavicle which had been snapped and small bottle of morphine to ease the pain which soon became excruciating.

I don’t remember much about the accident. I remember racing my friend down the mountain. Speeding so fast down a steep slope that my tire began to shake, in an attempt to slow down, I pressed the brakes. Then, all I remember is concrete and nothing. I don’t recall waking up, and unless my mother hadn’t told me, I wouldn’t even remember the two men that picked me up and carried me to the side of the road and stayed with me until my parents arrived. They were just behind us on their bikes, unaware that their daughter lay in an unconscious heap on the road.

It took me a year to gain enough courage to ride a bike; I wore a helmet that time. It was terrifying at first- flashes of the accident kept racing through my mind. However, that reaction didn’t last long. My father encouraged me to pedal my way through simple and flat streets of Washington D.C. and helped me ride up and down a simple hill. The fact is that no matter how much I fall, I know I always have to get back up.