Reviews, Recipes, and Random Slices of Life

As I was biking home the other day, a girl biking on the other side of the road fell over into the parking lane in front of the court building. There's a slight lip between the regular road and the parking lane; I can only figure her tire must have snagged in the groove. She fell over pretty hard and lay there crying, yelling, "Help me, O help me!"

By the time the road was clear enough for me to cross, two car drivers had pulled over and the women were clucking over the wounded chick. The attention embarrassed the girl, though she was still clearly in a lot of pain/shock and couldn't stop crying. The drivers asked if they should call an ambulance, cell phones at the ready. "No!" the girl cried out. "I don't have insurance. I can't afford that. I'm okay. I think I'm okay. I'm probably just bruised. I'm sorry."

Cue more clucking about how hurt people should have ambulances called!

I asked where it hurt. She indicated the whole side of her thigh, which is good, because it means it probably is just a bad bruise (I have no medical knowledge except that of somebody who's had various degrees of injury). I helped get her standing, on the theory that if she *could* stand, it meant she hadn't actually broken a bone. I got her and her things out of the street. She calmed down to more shuddery and less actual crying.

Then a man in a black SUV pulled over and hopped out, very concerned. He was associated with the court building, and he figured out what had happened. "We'll have a paramedic take a look at you," he said quickly, pulling out his cellphone. "Better now than later, if she decides to sue," he added in an undertone to the drivers. There was a subtle shift in attitudes toward the girl, from "poor wounded child" to "potentially litigious poor person." They might not even have noticed it themselves.

"I can't afford that!" she cried.

"No, no, they'll pay for it," I reassured her. "Thank the lawsuit-happy culture."

She managed a watery smile, and I biked away knowing that things would be taken care of.

I felt bad for her. I was lucky when I didn't have insurance, because I never had any serious hurt despite doing some mighty stupid things. She was just biking along, mostly minding the rules (though she wasn't wearing a helmet). But she got some form of healthcare, thanks to fear of litigation, so hurray!

Good things:
1. People cared enough to stop really quickly when they saw somebody hurt.
2. She seemed relatively undamaged.
3. She had a paramedic examine her at no charge to herself.