The papers and news organizations all requested that I write some sort of little memoir of what transpired. I personally don't like the thought of it, but since I feel like venting my feeling over this matter in some form, I decided what the hell. Something better to do with my time than watch the crap their playing on cable here in the hospital. For the record, if anyone feels offended by what I write, any loved ones of the victims involved in this tragedy, then I apologize in advance. News boys, here's that story you've been waiting two weeks for. I'm sure you're gonna edit out more than a few things before you publish it, the way you nosy little privacy-hating pip-squeaks normally do.
First off, allow me to be blunt for a moment. You all pretty much know a majority of the facts surrounding the tragedy. All you are looking for now is an eyewitness account to complete the picture. Well world, here it goes. The hideous tale of terror and tragedy, as viewed from the eyes of your average joe. If life has taught me anything in its thirty years of torment thrown down upon myself, its that the unexpected does happen. Just when you think everything is gonna turn out fine and you're finally gonna get your big break, some higher force in the universe decides to take a massive crap on top of you and leaves you reeking of its stench. Only way I can explain what happened to me. And if life really is so unexpected, then I got the mother-load of crap dumped on me. Bucket and all.
Two weeks ago, back when the world wasn't so damn cruel and I could stand on my own two feet and not be confined to some wheelchair. Back before I was stuck in this stinking linoleum hell-hole wearing nothing but a paper white robe with my butt hanging out the back. All was once well. It was two weeks ago when I was ready to take that next step up the ladder. Promotion, man. I was revved for it. Ain't easy getting ahead in life, especially when you're working and living in a city like San Francisco.
Work was just a bridge drive away, just a quick five dollar toll crossing over this cities stand out landmark, the Golden Gate. The time of day was perfect. No rush hour, no idiots on the road that think they can multitask, chit-chat on their cellular, gulp down coffee and steer with their damn knees at the same time. Just a big grin on my face as I adjusted my tie. You probably know the feeling. That tiny minuscule rush of Godliness, that feeling that you can take on the world. King of the mountain and all. Then, just as you're basking in the glory of your own private triumph over life's crap, your pulling a Jack and Jill tumble down that mountain you just conquered. Cursing all the way down. My bane, my tumble, was traffic.
No stop and go crap here, this was a full fledged fume gathering. Not a car was moving. But why? There's never traffic on the bridge at this time of day, never! What's the hold up? Doesn't take me long to see it. Of course what I was seeing was even harder to believe than the fact that there was traffic. Of course there's gonna be traffic when something is laying in the middle of the road. Especially on a bridge. I mean here I am sitting in a brand new red Mustang, something I had been saving up to buy since I was twenty. Stuck in a traffic jam two-hundred and twenty feet above San Francisco Bay...
...with a freakin' WHALE laying in the middle of the road!
At this point in time I didn't care how it got up here. I was too busy steaming over the fact that I was gonna be late for work. That I was gonna end up missing my big promotion and that little snot Fred from two floors down was gonna get the job instead. Sorry Fred, but the truth need be told. God only knows the look of rage I had in my eyes. It took awhile for the anger to subside before the whole "how the hell did this happen" feeling took affect. Honestly, nobody at the time knew what was going on.
I mean, here was a whale. A forty-nine foot long gray whale laying dead as a doornail across the middle width of the Golden Gate bridge. Traffic built up on both sides in an instant, and confused people were getting out of their cars just as quick. Nobody could go around the thing, for it had landed in the precise spot to block both ways of traffic. Ah, the questions that run through your mind in a time like this. They're numerous. Its over two-hundred feet from the bridge to the water, so I know the damn thing didn't jump up here. It didn't fall from the freakin' sky, and it sure as hell didn't fall off the back of some guys truck. So how does thirty-five tons of gray whale end up in the middle of the Golden Gate bridge? Well, thirty-one tons they told me later, considering the huge chunk of blubber and flesh that had already been bitten out of it.
You know that feeling you get when a thought runs through your mind, then another half of you says "Jinx!" That's what happened here. For as soon as everyone on the bridge, including myself, said the same stupid thing, it happens. I get out of my Mustang, shutting off the engine and locking my baby up tightly as I go to inspect this dead whale laying in the road. I get into a conversation with this portly fella named Hank. Don't know his last name yet, but his family sent me a get well card. I'll take this time to offer my condolences to them. Hank and myself were talking about...well what else. How a damn whale got in the middle of the road. Anyway, can't remember too much of what we were saying to each other. But Hank said the last words of the conversation, and I ironically was thinking the same thing. "It doesn't get any stranger than this."
Jinx!
How do you describe what happened next without sounding like a nutcase. I'll tell you how. You can't. Its impossible. Its utterly impossible to describe what happened next without somebody, somewhere in the world, thinking that you're crazy. We all thought we were crazy at first. What do you think would be going through your mind if some gigantic dinosaur head suddenly curled out from underneath the bridge? There just doesn't exist a rational thought in the human mind to contemplate the sight of it.
Maybe dinosaur head is a little off. More like a scaly seal head to me. I can only guess at the things true size, like all the scientist are doing now. All I know is that it was big enough to climb its way up the leg of the Golden Gate bridge and haul a thirty-five ton whale carcass half its own length with it. Where it went in the ten minutes between dumping the carcass on the bridge and the traffic pileup is beyond me. All I know is that there wasn't a single person who stuck around long enough to find out. If you've ever seen one of those Japanese monster movies where the giant creature emerges and everybody runs like their hairs on fire, then you pretty much get the gist of what happened next.
Hank and myself said to hell with any kind of goodbyes and both of us sprinted head long for our cars. Now that I think of it, that was probably the dumbest thing I've ever done. You'd think a Mustang would be the ideal car for outrunning any kind of monster. Some might say a Viper would do the job better, but I think there overrated as far as performance is concerned. All for looks. Of course, doesn't do much good what kind of car you have when you've got five other cars in front of and behind you. Still, the day could only get worse. Not just lose my promotion, possibly my job, not to mention my life. But there was no way, no freakin' way, that I was gonna lose my car today. Not if I could help it.
This serpent, whatever the hell it was, ignored all of us at first and instead continued ripping at the whale carcass. I swear to you it took at least four tons of flesh and blubber from the body in one bite. The thing was beyond big. Like something Godzilla should be fighting. I'm more of a King Kong kind of guy compared to Godzilla, but this thing looked like it could swallow Kong whole. It had to be at the very least a hundred feet long. Probably bigger from what I've heard. There still trying to figure out how something so heavy can move at all out of the water. I started my Mustang up just as it curled a good portion of itself up between the bridge cables. At first all we saw was an extremely long muscular neck, shimmering black with what looked like scales. I don't see how though, the thing was clearly mammalian to me based on the head alone. The damn thing had whiskers. Not the kind of whiskers you'd see on a catfish, that I would have expected. These were exactly like those of a seal or sea lion. My best guess is that's what it was, some kind of uber-gigantic seal with an abnormally long neck. But it also had gills. And this completely threw me off. About thirty feet of it curled out onto the bridge before the flipper emerged. Nothing but a black mass, like a deformed limb, about as big as a semi.
At this point the idiot behind me throws his beat up Volkswagen in drive and rams it hard into the back of my Mustang. If it wasn't for the whiplash, I'd have gotten out of the car and thrown his stupid hide to the beast in front of us. God knows what kind of damage he did to my bumper then. Doesn't matter now, anyway. I'm sure I'll get an angry letter from his family later for saying so. Pandemonium among people is like some cosmic black hole. It just plain ol' fashion sucks! Nothing good can come out of it in no way, shape or form. It just takes the already screwed-up situation and makes it worse. Case in point, the idiot at the front of the traffic jam laying on his horn as he speeds directly into the car behind him.
Now I don't know if this guy thought his high pitched Honda car horn was gonna scare off this hundred foot long sea serpent or what. All I know is that it had the reverse affect. This serpent was already in the process of hauling what was left of its whale feast back into the bay below, ready to leave all of us in bewilderment, when this idiot lays on his horn. By this time, everyone is hitting everyone. Fender-bender after fender-bender in their attempt to get as far from this thing as possible. We actually could have stood somewhat of a chance of escaping with little more than that.
but noooo...
The first shockwave to hit me that wasn't vehicular in origin shook the bridge when the serpent let the whale carcass fall from its mouth. Now thirty tons of anything hitting this bridge from a twenty foot drop is gonna make the Golden Gate do the shimmy. As soon as what was left of my composure returned, I was greeted with the loudest dog bark you can imagine. First there came a hiss from this things mouth as it gazed down at the horn-honking Honda. The only time I got a good look at its teeth. Conical in shape, double rows, chunks of pink blubber caught in between them. Then with a snapping of its jaws it lets forth this bark, again adding to my suspicion that it was primarily some kind of big freaking seal.
This guy had to have been the biggest idiot that had ever lived. No offense to his surviving loved ones, but come on. He suddenly throws his Honda into drive and floors it...right into the dead Gray whale. I don't care how strong some people say Honda's can be, its not gonna get you over or through a freaking whale. Now I've done some thinking here in the hospital about everything after that. My best guess is that this serpent was just protecting its meal, like all predators do. It saw this loud and annoying little white object plow into its fresh and somewhat filleted meal, and grew agitated.
From that moment on, every thought I had about Honda's being durable vehicles disappeared. Along with the Honda. The beast arced back like a snake preparing to strike. And like a snake, it struck. And the sight of it was just plain brutal. This serpent snapped its jaws a total of two times, just two, and this Honda was shredded into nothing. You couldn't even get spare parts from it if you wanted to. Shaking its head to and fro like a dog with a toy, the serpent went into a frenzy. And apparently, whatever it's tongue got out of the driver of that Honda amidst all the shredded metal, tasted good to this serpent. Its like feeding a toddler his first piece of chocolate. As soon as he's gulped it down and licked his chops he's asking you for more.
Now I'm not the type of guy to get scared. I wouldn't define it as fear, at least my reactions to it anyway. Whenever I get hurt either physically or emotionally, or I've got some kind of problem sticking in my face, I just get pissed. I guess if anger and fear are the same thing, then I was spewing forth all kinds of verbal fright in the drivers seat of my Mustang. You know, the kind of words that would give your mother a heart attack. By this time, its impossible for any of us to actually drive off, cause the panic of the idiots in front of and behind me has left us all stuck and dented. Ramming each other with little consent for the safety of the other driver or the well being of our paint jobs. After that, it was pretty much a demolition derby meets a buffet.
Second shockwave hits, pretty much the beginning of the end for the bridge from that point on. This thing swiped its fifteen-foot head and forty foot neck and in an instant, all the traffic in front of me was cleared. Cars just went flying, at least twenty of them from both sides of the bridge, tumbling through the air like a bomb had just gone off. I caught a glimpse of one, a truck, just get completely sliced in half by one of the bridge cables as it went soaring out of sight into the bay below. I waited for one of the airborne automobiles to come crashing down on top of my brand new dream car, crush me in the process and save me the trouble of being this sea serpents next bowel movement sometime later.
But noooo...
Seems this cruel little thing called life had more in store for me. Had more crap to dump on top of my head before it decided to end its pain. My Mustang is revving to life by the time the bridge finally stops shaking. Thing is, I've got about sixty feet of road in front of me, along with about forty feet of whale and a hundred feet of freaking sea monster between me and that little thing I like to call a good day. Nothing behind me but idiots who seem to have forgotten amongst their panic what the concept of reverse is. Not to mention the two-hundred twenty feet of open air and open sea below on either side of me. Not to mention the fact that this damn sea serpent now has its glazed black eyes fixed directly on me.
In short, I've got nowhere to go but down. Either down the gullet of the dino-seal, or down the non-existing two lane road of open air between the bridge and the strait it crosses. So what do I do? What do I do to survive this odd little turn of events that's turned my crap world into a mountain of manure? Well, asides from pissing my pants, which I'll admit I did, I floor it. I do what the idiot before me did. I panic. I say to hell with logic and do something other than wait for this monster to eat me. I'm suddenly struck with that last second of hope that God is gonna part the red sea, in this case the whale carcass, and clear me a path to freedom. At this point, everything becomes mostly a blur. But I've had some time in the hospital to piece it together.
Well, if you've ever hit a deer with a sports car, then you know that the car is gonna receive a whole lot more damage than the deer. Now, try multiplying that by I'd say, Bill Gates bank account, and you pretty much get the gist of my last second escape attempt. Dead whale beats Mustang every time. Not only that, but in those brief pulsing seconds of white that had clouded my vision as my air bags fly open and I receive my first of two concussions, but now my car has officially become part of this whale. In a matter of speaking. Whole front end of my Mustang is now lodged in the mess of blubber and flesh that was once this whales belly.
Well, I can only imagine what this gigantic sea serpent was thinking at the time, since I don't really remember seeing much of it afterwards. But if I were to compare my little red Mustang stuck in this whale to anything, then I'd compare it to the cherry you top off your hot fudge sundae with. For about five seconds I'm stunned and shaken from the crash, forgetting like some old timer where I am and what I'm doing, and why I've pissed my pants. Then my car is shaken to the point where I virtually black out. The last thought going through my mind being: "Well, guess I'm dead."
I come to on board a boat, blue sky above me, siren noises blaring in the distance as the waves lap against the hull. Regurgitating about a gallon of sea water onto some medic guy with a retro nineties Vanilla Ice hairdo that makes me vomit even more when I see it. I can't feel my left leg, leaving me to think for the five minute trip from the bay to the shore that its been torn off and eaten by the dino-seal. I don't know how many times I asked these medic guys where my leg was. Couldn't really see myself since my head was taped down to a stretcher. They ignored me all together. Mainly because their faces were all white with fear. They shoot me up with I presume morphine, since I black out again not long after the needle is stuck in my arm.
Wake up in the same linoleum hell-hole I'm in now with tubes sticking out of every possible orifice in my body, along with some new ones in my arms and beeping machines on either side of my bed. My leg as it turns out is still attached. But its so wrapped up in cast that I can barely tell if I still have one. Turns out it was partially shredded by either jagged metal or jagged teeth. Doesn't really matter now. Two concussions and a broken nose accompany it. Surprisingly that's it. A span of a week passes with this before I can finally get out of bed and actually ask a few questions. I don't get any answers at first. Their excuse being "Well we don't want to put anymore strain on you" and all that kind of crap. I eventually get handed a tape about two weeks in. Turns out a news chopper had videotaped the whole incident. Pulitzer Prize kind of stuff apparently. Not everyday your footage of an incident actually resembles a B-Monster movie.
Tapes rolling, and I'm watching from a different perspective everything I remember unfold. The serpent seal as it were, based on the shape of the rest of it, had slithered its somewhat streamlined body around the leg of the bridges city side tower. Can't really make out much of the whale it had hauled up there, since your attention can't be taken off the dino-seal sending twenty cars flying through the air with a swing of its head. I watch my red Mustang, knowing that I'm in it, speed swiftly into the whale carcass where it lodges itself about half way in. From this point on my curiosity is at peak, since after that I remember nothing. The serpent eyes my car up for a brief moment, before with a gnashing of its jaws it strikes forth and completely engulfs my car. How I survived that is the only question running through my mind at that time. Because this thing is literally trying to swallow my car whole, with me inside it.
The camera footage is a bit jumpy after this, don't know why. But once it steadies out I start to notice the serpent going into a panic. My red Mustang has fallen out of its mouth and landed upside down at the edge of the bridge. Teetering ever so much with each panicked slither of the serpents body. After awhile, I start to notice one of the bridge cables has dug its way into the bulk of the creature, cutting through its scaly hide like butter. This thing starts to freak. I mean writhing and barking and growling, obviously in pain. You can hear its whole commotion over the background noise of the choppers rotors. That's when your classic monster movie event takes place. The kind of event you expect to see solely in films. The serpent takes several gnashing bites at the cable, snapping three of them in its panic. Takes a lot of strength I hear in order to snap those thick cables. Then like a flimsy black pillar or a humpback whale leaping out of the sea, this sea serpent drops back into the bay. Splashing hard into the waves as its bulk fades beneath a spray of foam. The last bit of it to show up on the film is its back end, where a massive seal-like flipper slips off the bridge's leg and slaps the water before disappearing beneath the waves. Then comes that "how did I survive this" feeling again.
For in the next shot, the bridge collapses.
Now this was something I didn't figure had happened. For two weeks I was left with the impression that I was sent flying into the water and the serpent left after that. Nope. Turns out it decided to take a national landmark with it. Goes to show just how important a single cable on a suspension bridge can be, let alone three. The whole thing was like a domino affect. One cable snaps after the other, with some of them swiping apart what remaining cars there are on the bridge. Oh, and lucky me. I get to enjoy an unconscious last ride in my brand new red Mustang as it finally topples off the edge of the bridge and hits the water some two-hundred twenty feet down.
"You should be dead, my friend."
That's all the doctor standing beside me said as I continued watching the news clip. Too stunned to pay any heed to anything he was to say. My Mustang stays afloat the whole time as the entire mid portion of the Golden Gate bridge falls in on itself. The two, five-hundred foot tall orange towers that practically held the bridge up are pulled down by the remaining cables, hitting the bridge with enough force to shatter the concrete and steel roadway and send all eight-hundred thousand plus tons of it into the strait below with a violent splash of water. At least sixty cars went in with the rubble, God knows how many people being in them.
The whole commotion comes to a halt after awhile, and I can only imagine the shock on peoples faces as they had watched this some two weeks ago. The helicopter kept circling the devastation, kept its camera pointed down on the ruined structure that was once a national landmark. All too familiar memories of that ugly September day in 2001 just kept going through my head as I watched the footage. Then I get the notion after the shock. The question aroused in my head seemingly from out of nowhere. Where was I during this whole period of shock?
Logic dictates that by now, me and my car should have slipped beneath the waves and disappeared forever. But it turns out, as I'm watching this footage, there was my Mustang. Still afloat some hundred feet away from the other cars and broken debris of the Golden Gate jutting out of the waves. I had drifted into the bay apparently. You can barely make it out in the tape, just a red dot bouncing up and down ever so slightly. Looking more like a buoy than a car. Some boats come into view after awhile, and the tell-tale signs of flashing red and blue lights had gathered at each end of the collapsed bridge. I'm still sitting there in the hospital, watching all of this unfold and wondering still. Just how the hell did I survive this?
I get my answer, watching one of the boats pull up to my floating car and staying there for a good five minutes or so. After that the cameraman decides to zoom in on it and I happen to get a somewhat blurry glimpse of some men pulling a figure out of my car. That figure being me, still unconscious and apparently battered all to hell. I disappear onto the boat as it drifts away from my still afloat Mustang. I found out after watching the footage that from what the medic guys had said, the only reason my mangled car had stayed afloat was because a huge chunk of whale blubber had become lodged in the engine compartment and was keeping the car from going down. Blubber floats, apparently. I'll never get that phrase out my head now that its become my unwelcome celebrity catchphrase of sorts.
To all those clowns out there that came up with that ridiculous catchphrase, let me fill you in on a better one. You know that phrase "God works in mysterious ways?" I prefer that one better. I've kinda taken a liking to it after learning this. I mean, having my life spared by a chunk of whale blubber has got to be one of the most mysterious acts of God to have ever occurred in human history. I guess driving head long into that carcass turned out to be simultaneously the smartest and dumbest thing I've ever done. Seemed like that would be the end of it for me as far as all the crap of that day goes, as the footage continued to roll.
But noooo...
I have to endure the sight of this sea serpent, this freaking dino-seal the length of a blue whale, stick its ugly head back out of the water. Much to the surprise of the paramedics in the boat beside it. Apparently that was why their faces were so white with fear when I came to. Didn't bother me none that this monster had shown up again. What really churned my stomach was watching this damn beast snatch ever so greedily what was left of my beautiful red Mustang up in its jaws and slide beneath the waves. I was told later that it was probably the whale blubber it was after, but it still didn't subside the anger I had over it.
Turns out again that my car was spared the injustice of being digested by a hundred foot long dino-seal, and managed to bob its way to the surface one last time, before disappearing forever into the bay. The footage continues showing the same aerial view of the collapsed bridge and close up shots of the mangled remains of its mass that jutted out of the waves. The cause of it all, the dino-seal, appears one last time in the footage. Two black humps curl out of the water some good distance from the bridge, caught out of the corner of the camera man's eyes as he zooms his camera in on it from the circling news chopper. They soon slide away beneath the waves, showing the beast swimming its way west, back out to sea.
For two weeks the same footage was aired on every news channel that existed. Repeats of the serpent ravaging the cars and the bridge collapsing kept rolling over and over as so-called experts poured forth their theories and opinions on the matter. Scientist, along with several people that were labeled cryptozoologist or some crap like that were brought on TV to give their own little explanations of the matter. Turns out this San Francisco Bay Sea Serpent as they were calling it had been seen before, and was now a big celebrity.
They ran a contest afterwards. A freaking contest solely for naming the beast. The way Nessie was the name for the Loch Ness Monster. Biggest tragedy since 9/11 and this city decides to runs a contest? That's it, I'm moving east as soon as I get out of this hospital, I've had it. Even more typical, the lamest of all the names submitted wins the contest, apparently in a landslide vote. "Saint Francis." Wow, change the Spanish to English, my how clever! And I'm sure the original Saint Francis is turning over in his old Spanish grave at the thought of some dino-seal being named after him. Guess it'll have to suffice, for some entries were even worse. Bay Babe, Bridgebuster, San Franzilla, as well as the unlikable name "Bane of the Golden Gate." It was a treasured landmark after all. But I've heard that they're already planning to rebuild. My personal favorite was " The Forty-Niner," since I'm a bit of a baseball fan. But apparently I'm the only one who is.
Anyway, before the incident this thing had been seen numerous times in the bay area. Now I don't call a couple of sightings "numerous," but apparently it had been enough to strike an interest in it long before it decided to rear its ugly head for the whole world to see. Ninety-two people died that day. One of them literally eaten. Drowned, crushed by the bridge or mangled by their own vehicles as they were launched off the bridge by this monster, and all these science dudes can talk about is what the damn thing is, then give it a freaking nickname. Horrible...
They were talking and gabbing on the news stations about what it could be. Some throwback to ancient seals that had evolved gills and basic zoological crap like that. A new family of creatures that were half reptile, half mammal, and all ugly. Just one theory after another added to the pile. One of them even mentioned, and I kid you not, radioactive contamination, as the cause for this things existence. Now if that isn't an example of pop culture dominating the opinions of society, then I don't know what is. Oh, so its big and scaly, ate some cars and broke a bridge. Yep, gotta be the result of nuclear fallout. At this point I don't really care what it is, where it came from, or where its going. So long as "Saint Francis" and any buddies he may have stays the hell away from me from now on.
Apparently I'm famous now, since I was the only survivor of the incident. Two weeks and I'm already one of those weirdos that people find "inspiration" in. My boss has given me some time off from work due to the incident, and apparently I got the promotion I wanted. Either out of sympathy or for driving my car into the torn open belly of a gray whale. There's already T-shirts, mugs and garbage like that being made by vendors celebrating the incident. Instead of "Nuke the Whales" it gets even cornier. "Don't Nuke the Whales, Hit 'em With Your Mustang." Complete with bad artwork depicting the incident and a sly grinning sea serpent befitted with fork and knife and polished white hanky. Typical capitalist preying on tragedy to earn a quick buck. Not to mention that damn awful tag line "Blubber Floats." I swear I'm gonna kill the guy that decided to slap that phrase on a bunch of T-shirts. Not just because the line is stupid, but the fact that he managed to find enough stupid people gullible enough to buy them and make a profit!
I just had my cast taken off and my leg has got the texture of fried chicken. Scarred for life apparently. Oh well, leaves me something to show my kids if I have any. Apparently life wasn't cruel enough to mangle anything else in particular along with my leg, so I can still hold out the hope of having kids someday. Just gotta find the right girl as well. I'm sure there will be plenty of them flocking my way now that I'm in some sort of spotlight. Freeloaders, gold-diggers, whatever you wanna call them there not the type of girl I'm looking for so ladies, there's your early warning. But if the right one does happen to come along someday then who knows. Maybe I can croon my way into some lucky ladies heart with a little bit of Sinatra, or Bennett, whatever your preference is regarding that popular song. Modified lyrics of course to fit my own little experience in life. Not too sure if it would work, but if life has taught me anything, its that the unexpected does happen.
The Golden Gate is gone now fallen to the bay, the glory that it was has simply slipped away, some terrible monster ripped its foundations to shreds, and left me and my car as good as dead.
I left my car in San Francisco Bay, deep on the seabed it calls to me.
To be where little fish glide and sea serpents survive.
Does it have gills or does it breathe air, I don't care.
My car waits there in San Francisco Bay, beneath the blue and windy sea.
When I come home to you, San Francisco Bay, your damn serpent will be waiting for me.
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