But the GOOD news is....

Let me just start off by saying that today was one of the roughest our family has had in a while. Today one of our greatest business fears came to pass...No, Michael did not become so ill he can't run the business; but, our driver totalled one of the trucks. Let me first just say that our kids haven't been sleeping well in their beds since we transitioned them upstairs. So, Michael and I haven't been sleeping well either. :)

This morning he crawled into bed with me and we fell back asleep for about 45 minutes. It was so nice to be all curled up together with our kids watching TV upstairs. Well, all but Gideon. What was HE doing you ask. He was PLAYING WITH THE TOILET BRUSH!!! EW EW EEEEWWWWWWWWWW!

Anyway, Michael got up to put it away and I was hoping for a few more minutes when I heard Michael running down the hall and yelling at me. "Get up! Richard's been in an accident. The EMT is with him now!" (Apparently Michael had left his phone downstairs and he didn't hear it ring when Richard called the first time.) The home phone immediately (no kidding) rang and I ran to get it. It was Karen, Richard's wife. She was talking calmly, although obviously shaken. She said that Richard called and said he had been in an accident and couldn't get ahold of Michael. I asked her if he was OK. She said he had a cut on his head but was talking strongly and seemed to be OK otherwise. She was on her way to meet him at the hospital. They were getting ready to transport him to the ER. She said he said that he went off into a ditch on the side of the road. My mind was reeling at this point of the repercussions of such a thing as well as hoping that Richard was really as good as it sounded like he was. So, here we are running around because after Michael finished with the scene he was going to have to finish the route. He was getting ready and I asked him if he wanted me to go too. He said, "Yes, that might be a good idea." So I got the kiddos ready and we left very quickly. (nothing to eat for any of us except the boys had a couple of pieces of leftover harvest candy.) On the way out the door Michael was able to speak to the officers at the scene who said that the truck was totalled. Gulp. Now, in my mind I am picturing Richard running off the road into a deeper drainage ditch possibly hitting a stone pipe and that's how he "totalled" the truck in a "ditch" and managed to get a small gash on his face. When we pulled up to the scene I was HORRIFIED to find that that's NOT at all what had happened. The "ditch" was really- I'm not quite sure what to call it...not deep enough to be a ravine, maybe a hill, definitely NOT a ditch. The truck went down about 50-60 feet and took out a few small trees in it's wake. The cab was crushed in at the top and sides. Obviously, he had rolled the truck. It was sitting upright, stopped by a group of small trees. I think, besides the comments I made about it NOT being a ditch and the fact that he rolled it, I just stood there with my hand on my mouth and praised God that Richard was still alive. Now, the body (garbage packer) of the truck looked good. We talked to the officers at the scene and the GSP (georgia state patrol) officer said that R didn't remember what happened. It's no wonder considering the rolling thing. The probs with that are- Our insurance co is going to have a field day with this. Getting commercial insurance on a garbage truck is actually fairly difficult. Getting it at a reasonable price is quite difficult. Getting either after a totalled truck is really hard. :(:(
Worker's Comp on a garbage man is already very high...now, it's going to go up even more. :(:(:( We're looking at a substantial amount of money we're going to be eating here, not to mention that even though we have full coverage we will not be able to buy this same set up (truck/compactor) at the price the insur co will give us. Did I mention that while all this horrifying info was going through my brain I was praising God for sparing R and looking in horror at the scene before me? Michael started down the hill to retrieve the route books so he could finish the route. I was on the top of the hill because I still had all three boys in the car and wasn't sure they would stay put. I was hoping, but not sure. At this point my pastor's wife came out of the house next door and said good morning. She watched the boys while I joined my husband. He was shaking the glass out of the books and putting the scattered pages back into the books in the correct order. I, meanwhile, was taking in the scene...The mangled doors, the glass, the blood everywhere. We were walking in blood, the door was sprayed with blood. I'm thinking at that point...could this gash be bigger than we thought? There was quite a bit of blood, although head wounds can bleed a lot even when small. The mood at the truck was grim. I knew what Michael was thinking. What it looked like happened was that R wasn't paying attention and veered too far off the road and got "sucked" down the hill. This would be a concern for obvious reasons. We cannot have a driver who isn't paying attention at all times. We are a small company and the trucks we have are a big investment. Could we trust him with the other newer vehicle after this? We were also noticing that the compacter held up incredibly well during the accident. Those things are built like a TANK! There wasn't even a dent on it that I noticed even the side leaning up against the trees. (Later we noticed damage underneath so we'll see how that pans out.) Amazing. I went back up the slope and Michael came up shortly. About this time Ruth (my pastor's wife) and John (my pastor) offered to let me and the kids come into the house to wait for the tow truck. Michael was leaving to go do the route. Ruth and John took the two older boys into the house with them while Michael gave me the phone numbers to the towing company and the place we needed it towed to (where they could access the packer damage). He left and I went to go into the house when Ruth came out to get me and told me that to add to the drama it seemed there was a bear in the woods (next to where we were) and told me to come inside lest I get caught with it. I hurried inside with the "baby" on my hip and was warmed by the scene of my two boys in bar chairs eating cereal. I was SO relieved that they were feeding them. I was thanking God that in the midst of a crises my kids were being fed hours before I expected them to be able to eat. Yeah. I gave the baby some Cheerios and Ruth offered me some coffee. I asked if it was decaf and she said yes. I told her that I would like a cup. She said that God must have had her make that just for me because
when she made it she realized it was decaf and wondered why she had accidentally made that because she didn't want decaf. About that time the phone rang. It was a neighbor. He was telling her that the bear was not a bear but a wounded deer. My first thought was, "WHAT?!" I mean, deers and bears don't exactly look alike- AT ALL. First of all there is a size difference, plus the antler difference. (LOL) Anyway, the neighbor put it down because it was wounded. Michael received a call from that neighbor (who also goes to our church) letting him know that possibly that's what had happened. Possibly Richard had hit the deer and that's what caused the accident. It was a fresh hit and if anyone else had hit it they would have sustained some damage. The bumper wasn't damaged but then again the roll down the hill didn't damage it either so...why would the deer have. Bummer. Richard cannot remember what happened and we cannot prove the deer thing. :(:(:( Oh, and I must be turning into a redneck because when I went to play CSI agent (find the dead deer and see if there was a blood trail to the truck) I asked Ray (the man who shot the deer) if I could keep it to eat. He said sure. He didn't want to haul it out of the woods. I decided I didn't want to either; especially with the three boys.

Meanwhile the tow guys are pulling the truck up the hill using a wench and pulley. That was at least interesting to Ruth, myself, and especially the boys.

The rest of the day was a blur. We got out of there about 10:30am. The boys and I stopped to check our drop box in town because a new customer was supposed to leave a payment. Guy didn't leave it. :( grrr. Then we got Michael some food from Sonic, drove out to give it to him, went back home, changed the answering machine to let people know we were running late but would pick their trash up, went to Richard's house to hug his wife and deliver his lunch bag and extra clothes bag he requested, talked with Karen and saw a pic of the gash on his head. HUGE gash would be more the word. It was about 5 inches long and at least an inch and a half laid open. YUCK! He also has two broken ribs but miraculously seems to have no concussion. Thank-you Lord!

After we left their house we went home to get a garbage can to deliver to a new customer. Michael had said he would deliver them today and our name isn't Reliable Garbage for nothing so the boys and I delivered the carts today, one at a time because that's all that would fit in the van. The first house was a bust because there was no check. The second one was good. The third one I had to track down the check, couldn't, but got ahold of the customer and he told me where it was. Whew! After all that it was about 2:30 and the boys had been in the van for about 4 hours. So, I took them to the park and we played for about an hour. I was REALLY tired though so we went home and I finished Michael's laundry for him and tried to take it a little bit easy. (easier said than done) So, there was A LOT of bad stuff today but there were some good things too. The GOOD news is....that Richard is going to be OK. Praise the Lord for that. Please pray for us as we wade through the paperwork and make decisions in the coming days. Pray for clarity and peace. Please pray that Richard remembers what happened.

Thanks guys. I wanted a record of this. Thanks for sharing my day.

Blessings!- Angela :)