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April 2010 Vol. 10 No. 3
Carlton's Corner
The New Normalby Doug Carlton One day in 1989, Don Piper finished a morning conference and headed toward home in his Ford Escort, looking forward to spending a quiet weekend with his family. The details are fuzzy, but somehow Don's car was struck head-on by an 18-wheeler at full speed. Don was trapped between twisted metal and broken glass, and it seemed certain that no one could survive such an impact. In fact, not one but several paramedics pronounced Don dead and covered the wreckage with his body still inside. It wasn't until well after an hour later that a bystander heard sounds from the wreckage. Don somehow had survived the tragedy. It took several more hours to extract Don from his car as doctors waited at the hospital. The extent of Don's injuries would take the rest of this article to describe, but let me sum it up by saying that he has had 34 surgical procedures and endured what he has described as nonstop pain that no modern-day reliever could...
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