By Patrick Robinson

When I was about seven I should have died.  But that was only the first time.

I’ve written about this before, from the perspective of  the importance of gratitude but I think some specifics might help illuminate my overarching point.

We lived in a house with a basement and some cement stairs that led down to it. Along the upper edge was a brick planter box. I had been out playing and for reasons I don’t recall, took a step up and peered over the edge into the mini abyss. Just then, my younger brother Scott, still in diapers, came up behind me and pushed me. I fell headfirst to the very base of the stairs with my forehead as the point of impact. I didn’t black out, but remember it really hurting  and feeling disoriented. I probably had a concussion but I’m not sure we knew about those that much in 1958. It became a big lump on my forehead and to this day I have bony protrusion there.

It would be another eleven years before my next brush with death. I was riding in the middle of the wide front bench seat of a gray 1959 Chevy Impala driven by my friend Dan. Another friend Greg was sitting by the door. We were out driving around one night and tried to take a left on to Fourth Avenue SW from SW 108th.  Out of nowhere, a car, traveling around 75 mph  T-boned us, completely smashing the Impala into an L shape. I was thrown into the back seat  breaking my rib cage and damaging my left knee. Dan had his back broken and was paralyzed for life, Greg had his arm broken in multiple places and collapsed his lung as it broke his ribs too. They had to use the “jaws of life” to pry open the wreckage and get us out.

Their insurance paid me $2500.  For weeks I was spaced out and the whole period is hazy for me. I don’t remember the actual incident. I suffered traumatic amnesia. But they told all of us, ‘You could have been killed. It’s amazing you survived.”

A couple of years later, I was again, out riding around with three friends around 11 o’clock at night and the driver thought he had a fast car. He did actually, but his problem was that he had more testosterone than brains. He felt the need to prove it…like a lot. Not knowing this though I got in the back seat. We were driving south on Ambaum Blvd. and then he got on 128th SW and since it’s a flat, straight road, and he was apparently an idiot, he gunned it quickly going over 70.  We all snapped back in our seats and he laughed, then tried to take a quick right on a side street in case any cops had seen him. He hit a patch of gravel and tried to correct, but lost control. We smashed into a car in a driveway at high speed, sending us all forward, no seatbelts and way before airbags. Shockingly we were not injured, so we piled out of the now completely totaled car, looked at each other and saw the lights in the house come on. That did it. We booked. Sure enough the cops showed up and then went looking for us. I was literally laying down in some high grass about a half mile from the wreck as the searchlight from the cop car shone over the area. I was way luckier than the driver. He actually did the right thing and hung out. But again I was spared.

About a year later I was feeling adventurous and knew where I could get a rubber raft and where I could borrow a wet suit. I wanted to ride the rapids on the Cedar River. I called my friend Kevin and he said he’d join me. We drove out to a likely place in Maple Valley and inflated the raft…and jumped in it.. About five minutes later it became apparent that the raft was leaking, but by then we approached a high spot in the river with a swift current on the other side. Sure enough the raft rolled over. Kevin, behind me, managed to clamber out, and make it to the river bank. I was not so lucky, or capable. The current caught me and it was fast. I could feel it almost wanting to pull me under. I pushed my arms down to propel me up and grabbed at some overhanging branches. The muscular water pulled at me, lifting my legs up but at the same time pulling my wetsuit bottoms down around my knees, locking them together. I screamed to be honest. This was terrifying. Then, I had a moment of clarity. The fear stopped.  I let go.

I briefly submerged, turned in the water and saw that I was being swept toward a giant log jam some 75 feet away. I could see the current, even stronger now like a green ribbon, flat and dark, pouring into its shadow. Five feet before going into what was certain death, I pushed down hard and then quickly raised my arms over my head grabbing onto the log over the hole. I clung to it even as the current insisted, pulling the wetsuit down to my ankles. I could not climb out.

Just then I looked up and to my right. It was Kevin!

He had managed to run down through the bushes on the riverbank and climbed out atop the logjam. He reached down and took my hand. Raring back he hauled me up enough so I could climb a little and then he helped me get out of the water. He had saved my life.

Back to cars for a moment. I have been in six car accidents total in which the vehicle was completely totaled. Not worth attempting repair. I wasn’t driving in all of them but no matter how you see it… that’s a lot.

I’ve also had three (small) heart attacks, and once when I was experiencing severe abdominal pain, drove myself to the hospital and they rushed me into surgery to remove my gall bladder. Normally that’s a common and uneventful surgery.

In this case they told me if I had waited another 15 minutes I’d be dead.

So, after all this, I’m sure your response is to suggest your own close calls. That’s fine. I understand the impulse. But I hope you take from mine and your own, the same conclusion. That your life has a larger purpose. Something you are meant to do. Some good you can  accomplish.

Now all you have to do is do it.