Seven Facts Followup

My brother's comment on my seven facts post stirred my sister's memory of my very first car accident (Not that I have had MANY after that!)

The accident caused like $2,000 worth of damage--a fact that will be forever ingrained into my head by my parents (It actually increases over the years due to some weird parental inflation. I believe it might be up to $12,000 worth of damage now...). My mother tried to prepare my father to mitigate the inevitable screamfest. She told him that I had broken my leg in the accident (in reality there were NO injuries--I don't think I was even going more than 5 miles an hour...) in order to give him some perspective.

My dad can be volatile to say the least, so I was girding myself for the upcoming drama. In the spirit of "the best defense is a good offense," I planned to point out the fact that neither parent had spent quality time with me letting me practice driving. I was all ready to weather the storm of my father's wrath.

When he got home, he sat next down next to me and said, "I heard you had a bad day."

I burst into tears.

According to my sister,

[T]he whole incident proved to be a rare good moment for dad. I remember when dad got home Jamie and I were hiding at the top of the stairs halfway terrified that he would beat you to death for damaging the car!!!! When he came in and said, “I heard you had a bad day," James and I looked at each other with shock and utter disbelief. You weren’t going to die!! I think I cried actual tears of relief.

Yeah, I never thought he was going to beat me for damaging the car. Give me a good tongue-lashing maybe, and never let me forget it. I was spared the former, although not the latter.