Up high

I was in the back of an unusual truck. It was a flat bed w/ racks on the sides and an open top, but there were about 10 levels of racks and I was in the top level, probably close to 100 feet above the ground. And I was driving.  The road was a flat level two lane state highway and we were coming into a town, so I started to slow down.  Right at the same time the road was suddenly covered w/ hard pack snow and ice and the truck started to slide sideways with its back end swinging around into the oncoming lane of traffic. There were several cars coming and as the front car saw what was happening to me he stepped on his brakes and soon there were several cars sliding down the entire highway toward me and a disastrous collision.

I knew that hitting them head on would be far worse than going into the ditch so I stepped on the gas a little and the truck headed off the road into the ditch.  My position at the top of a 100 foot tower was now precarious. As the truck went onto the slope down to the ditch my platform pitched over 30 or 40 feet. I thought it was going to topple over and I was thinking about climbing to the high side and trying to run down the side as it went down to save a terrible fall, but when the truck hit the bottom and the slope went back up it righted itself and swung way over the other way. Eventually it came to a stop upright and having missed hitting the oncoming traffic.

The platform became a building at this point.  I was still up about 100 feet in the air and the sides were open to the world, but it was made out of concrete and had heavy columns holding things up. There was a crane along the edge that had lifted a load up to this floor and I had hold of a guide rope that was to pull the crane’s load in onto the floor as the crane lowered it.  The crane started to lower and it immediately became apparent that I wasn’t strong or heavy enough to pull it in as it started to drag me along the floor.  It wasn’t going down fast, but I wasn’t having any affect on it at all.  I looked for something to wrap the rope around to help hold it.  I saw a traffic signal, a steel pole mounted on a concrete base so I quickly threw a wrap of rope around the post.

As the post took the load it started to bend.  It went over to almost a 45 degree angle and the lights started to pop off of it. I realized it wasn’t going to work so I quickly loosened it and ran to the next concrete column. The column was on the edge of the building so I couldn’t run around it, but was able to throw the rope around it and make it secure.  I was upset that I hadn’t been able to get the load onto the floor and that I’d wrecked a traffic signal.  The job boss came over and looked at the traffic signal and I thought he was going to be mad, but he said it wasn’t my fault, that I was just trying to do my job, and we were weeks ahead of schedule anyway, so we could absorb the damages w/ no trouble.

Later, I was at the corner of 86^th & Michigan Road in Indianapolis where a group of people were gathering after a canoe trip.  Ruth and Cathy Vincent were walking over to where I was parked and each was carrying arms full of orange life jackets.  I wanted to get them into my car, but there were two people in the back seat already and a large, fat woman was lying across the front seat.  As I tried to drive closer to where Ruth and Cathy were so they wouldn’t have to walk as much the car lurched a little and the fat woman’s teeth banged into the armrest on the door.  She gave me an angry look.  Ruth and Cathy saw the situation and didn’t think they would be able to fit into the car so they said they’d just walk back.  They headed south burdened down w/ all their lifejackets just as the sun was going down.  I wasn’t comfortable w/ them doing that, and I wanted the fat woman out of my car or at least of my lap.