Freakin Freeway

This is one of the incidents, or I would say accidents that is popular amongst my friends and family. As scary it was for me back then, it has never failed to make people laugh in surprise. You know how when you tell people something and they don’t believe you and then they exclaim –WHAT???!! and just go crazy laughing at it? Yes, this is one such incidence. I prefer to categorize it under the section ‘My adventures in the US’. I should also mention that I’m writing about it not because I’m proud of it, no, not at all, it makes me feel embarrassed and stupid, but the reason I’m sharing the story because it’s made a remarkable imprint on my memory and if at all you are new in the US and have come from a country that does not have such an organized traffic system, then this story might be a lesson for you.
 
So, I start with the description of the story as one of the scariest experiences of life...
It was during my first quarter at OSU, Fall 2009. I was studying for the mid-terms. There were some chapters from a book that I wanted to read. Since I didn’t have the book I decided to go to a nearby bookstore (B&N). For the sake of gaining reader’s empathy, I think it is important to mention that the reason why I thought that bookstore was nearby was because I remembered seeing a big billboard of that bookstore several times when I would be in my friend’s car.  Also, it is important to mention that I have great friends, and if I ever had to go some place a little away from campus they would always willingly drive me to that place. This was the very first time I thought maybe I should go on my own, also since I was confident of that bookstore being close by, I managed guts to go there on my bike.

As strange as it might sound, I don’t know if you are aware of people who try reaching the airport by looking at the direction in which the planes are flying? Such people first spend sometime looking for a spot where they can actually see the planes and then spend rest of the time judging the direction in which the plane might be flying out of or about to land. One of my friends does that and I was really impressed, because after a lot of beating around the bush she was successful at dropping me at the airport. Why I shared the airport story is because I sort of adopted the similar strategy. I first rode around intuitively in the direction to be able to spot that bill board sign of that bookstore and then decided to just go towards it. When I saw the sign, it seemed as if it was across a bridge, so I started biking towards that bridge. Now, I think it is important to mention here that more than logical, I am an intuitive person and as I was riding on that small stretch of road which seemed like a bridge, my brain was getting signals that something is going wrong. I decided to ignore my intuition and kept riding and eventually landed on what I thought in my head back then-a very busy road, full of rash drivers (I know, stupid, right?). I was stunned, but now since I was able to see myself getting closer to the bookstore sign I got excited and started pedaling ahead. However, only within couple of seconds, to my utmost despair it clicked to me that I was on a freakin FREEWAY!!!  Honestly, not in my wildest thoughts had I ever imagined that small path that looked like a bridge, which I thought would lead me to the other side of the road would actually a RAMP leading to 305S!  
It occurred to me then that I should probably go back to where I came from, but then I was reminded a friend telling me once that it is against rules to go against traffic on one way. So, I thought that I shouldn’t break the rule and kept moving forward. I partially blame my friend for this accident because while telling me about traffic rule he/she didn’t warn me that riding bikes on the freeway was also against rules! And wish to believe that its because of that I was moving amidst cars driving at the speed of 70mph.

It was scary as hell to ride the bike with other zillion speeding cars. Everytime a car passed by me it felt as if it was going right through me. I was really scared and felt very helpless. I kept thinking about all the people whom I could've called and asked for help but realized that they probably wouldn’t be able to help me as I was on my bike on a freeway where as far as my view could go there was no car stopping on the way.

So I kept going...
It was a super hot today and I was riding sticking close to the edge of the road. While riding, I saw the sign of the store up close, it felt as if it was right next to me, but then I was on a freeway. By this time, I gave up the thought of going to that bookstore and was more concerned about getting back home safely.  After about 15-20 mins I reached an exit and realized that I can go on the otherside of the road and merge with cars going in the opposite direction and go back to where I came from. Sounds simple, right? but trust me it was one daring thing to cross that freeway where people didn't seem to have car breaks.

I stopped and kept staring at the all cars that were zooming past me. In my mind i was prepared that I might have to hang in there probably for most part of the day. However, after sometime I gathered some guts to cross the freeway (caution: please don’t envision the situation or judge me, this was all an accident). I decided to cross the freeway after I observed the number of cars passing came down a bit. So, I grabbed the opportunity and ran with my bike. (forgot to mention that I gave up riding after sometime as I realized that if get hit by a car while riding I would probably get hurt more so I was walking with my bike!!). I was almost on the other end of the road when a car honked at me. I didnt care to see the face of the driver but I’m pretty sure he must have cursed me in his mind (Crazy Woman!!).

Although somehow I got to the other side of the road and started going back, the feeling was same as the cars were still passing by crushing my heart! I was in trauma and had come into grips with the fact that it was probably my last day on earth. I was thinking that if it were my last day, then what would be my last wish, I chose to think about my last wish to avoid thinking about the miserable situation I was in.
Luckily, while I was focusing on my last wish, which I was not able to decide, I managed to get through that Freakin Freeway. Can't explain how scared I felt after going through that experience. I was in shock, big shock, my heart continued to beat as fast as it could for the rest of the day. My senses were numb and my eyes, I don’t think ever fluttered for a very long time.

I have a tendency to learn from my experiences which are usually mistakes (Oh, Well!). So the lesson learnt that day was....never trust the signs, esp the big ones, instead look up for directions beforehand!