Nine months ago, my best friend Jordon, our friend Payton, and I were in a car accident together one rainy October night. We were coming around a sharp curve, and the slick roads took control as we spun across the double yellow and flipped five times, until finally landing upside down in a ditch. I was shaken; we all were. I couldn’t sleep for days; not without hearing the sound of glass shattering, or feeling like I was falling or flipping. I resorted to the only way I knew how to deal with things: writing. I wrote about my car accident for my English class, reliving every terrifying second like it was yesterday, with every finger that touched the keyboard. However, nine months later I am still learning and realizing things from my car accident that I may never have otherwise.

For what it’s worth, no one was almost killed. Jordon and I ended up in the hospital for a few hours, Jordon longer than I, but no one was put on life support, and no one needed surgery. However, during the actual car accident, no one knows what was going to happen next. We all could have died on the spot by some sort of impact injury. Payton’s legs could have been crushed in the back seat, my back could have been broken, and Jordon could have had serious brain damage. Yet here we are, all going to school, all laughing and smiling every day. It’s the “what ifs” in life that make me stop and think about what happened. What if I had lost my best friend? What if she had lost me? What if we were both seriously injured for the rest of our lives? I don’t dwell on those because as you can see, we are both OK and still best friends. Yet they linger.

Little things from our accident still effect me at times. I am always the first to grip something around a sharp turn. I am always the who doesn’t want to go somewhere if it’s raining outside, and I am very selective of who I ride in a car with. I wouldn’t say I’m still traumatized by what happened that night, but it gave me a new outlook on life and the relationships I have with people. Petty drama has always been something I have had to deal with, whether it was middle school drama about who sat with who at lunch or high school drama about more serious situations. Yet I found myself thinking about what is really worth it. I will fight for friends like Jordon for my whole life if need be, because they are the people who keep me grounded. But I refuse to let petty drama get in the way of what could be a great friendship. I just recently started getting closer with someone who was someone I never seemed to get along with, but we put everything aside and began a fresh start. Those are the kinds of friendships that are worth something.

I got a fresh start with faith as well. I did not grow up in a religious household, which never bothered me until I met Jordon. Every time I went to church with her I cried. I was always embarrassed but I realized I was crying because I was witnessing something so beautiful that I had never learned. I wasn’t taught to love God or pray or go to church. That was not a bad choice on my parent's part and I am never angry at them for it. After my car accident however, I gained faith. I knew it was Jordon’s mother watching over us that night. I knew there was a reason we could flip as many time as we did and come out alive. And ever since then, I listen to songs about faith differently, I appreciate going to church with my friends more, and I fully believe and understand that everything happens for a reason.Jordon is one of the most important people in my life. She came into my life right after her mom passed away, and we became best friends almost immediately. I fully believe she was placed in my life to make me a stronger person and I believe I was placed in her life to fill at least a small part of the void her mother's death left in her heart. Our car accident was the most terrifying and painful experience in my life, but we made it out stronger as friends and sisters than we ever have been or would have been.