After a spill at 35th/Barton (map), a West Seattle bicyclist found himself deluged with offers of help from multiple Good Samaritans, so he wanted to publicly thank them – read ahead for the story Ryan e-mailed last night:
I was enjoying a sunny lunch time bike ride when I had the misfortune of crashing my bike while heading north on 35th just before Barton. I had been watching for a break in traffic to turn left onto Barton while moving into the left turn lane and signaling my turn with my left arm, unfortunately I wasn’t paying attention to the yellow “traffic Turtles” and (I think) hit one straight on at about 25 mph which sent me over the bars into a headfirst slide towards the cross walk.
It happened so fast that I am bit fuzzy on the details, but I recall the sudden jolt that I was no longer holding the handle bars, catapulting forward, realizing “this is not good”; hitting the pavement, I think, with my left shoulder/upper arm, then belly surfing the pavement. I am sure I let out a shout, possibly an expletive, and I may have shrieked like a 2nd grade girl – not really sure.
What I do recall is that literally before I could catch my breath, and thinking dully that being in the middle of a 4 lane road on the ground was not optimum, I was suddenly surrounded by people, asking if I was ok, rounding up stray bike parts that had “yard saled” in my crash and generally keeping cars from running me over.
I had people offer to call an ambulance (no thanks), give me a ride home (I will call my wife), do you need anything? They were all so intent on helping me that no one noticed my weak attempt at humor when I told them, “I’m OK; I think the ground broke my fall.”
A very nice young lady, who told me she was a nursing student, politely but sternly urged me to sit down as it would be easy for me to go into shock. The 7-Eleven guy came out and handed me the phone, saying he had the Police on the line as he thought a car had hit me; after I explained that I didn’t need Police or emergency services, and that I had actually crashed all by myself, the kind Sikh gentleman asked me if I needed any water or a ride or any help.. The man from the produce market at that intersection walked across the street while I was waiting for my ride to make sure I was OK and inquire if I had been hit by a car.
Back home, as I was wincing while cleaning up my various scrapes, I paused to think wow; I didn’t break any bones, i was wearing my helmet and no one was right behind me in a car, but mostly I was in awe of the instantaneous outpouring of kindness, caring and support from total strangers. Thank you all.
Ryan Surface
West Seattle
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