Vent - Dad's injury

A few weeks ago, I witnessed possibly one of the worst things I'll ever witness in my life - I watched a bundle of heavy marble slabs topple over my dad.

My dad has his own small business importing and exporting slabs of natural stone, and his only warehouse staff for the time being is himself and me. I operate the forklift, and he does the ground work of separating the slabs and keeping them steady while we move them. It's a dangerous job, especially for the person on the ground - and I witnessed the consequences of it.

Thankfully, my dad is okay. He got away with only a gash in his hand and a fractured knuckle, but it could've been so much worse. We were just getting started moving some slabs around, when as he tried to separate two slabs from the bundle of eight, the bundle behind it came toppling over, causing a domino effect. From there, the bundle in front of him came over center and, from where I sat, completely covered him. I screamed and became completely frozen. Thankfully, we had a technician working on our other forklift, and he was able to stay calm and call 911, but I stayed frozen. Our next door neighbors came over and helped him out from under the rubble, but I stayed frozen. My dad's business partner tried to comfort me, and turned me away from the scene. And I stayed frozen.

He was able to only get away with a minor injury because the wall behind him and a stack of posts next to him absorbed most of the impact, and no other part of his body was crushed thanks to the mesh backing on each slab, which kept the broken chunks from coming down on him completely. He instinctively raised his hand to defend himself from the impact, and it got pinned between the slab and the wall. 

I hate that I froze. I genuinely thought, for a moment, that he had died in a most brutal way, and I watched it happen. It took too long for me to calm down, too long to find a towel, or the first aid kit. The whole time, he tried to assure me by saying "it's okay", but at one point I yelled back "no it's not!" in a panic. I don't know why I said that, but now every time he recounts the events, he makes fun of me for it. That kinda hurts.

Occasionally, the scene of the slabs coming over on him replays in my mind, unwelcome. I think of the streams of blood gushing out of his hand and shudder, and I have to close my eyes tightly to squeeze the thought out. And when my dad talks about it to his friends, I have to choke back tears. I haven't spoken to anyone about it at length like this before now - but I can't ignore the impact of it anymore.

 It's kind of embarrassing revealing stuff like this publicly online, but for now, I feel it's the only way I can talk about it. I hate being vulnerable but I promised myself I'd use this blog as a sort of outlet for the things I have trouble talking about. So if you read this far, I truly appreciate it, and hope you have a great day :)