Here’s why her near-death experience in Sierra Nevada mountains was disappointing

I think we all believe that when our life flashes before our eyes, or when we definitely think death is imminent, our brain will relive the best moments of our existence. Or maybe that we’ll use our last moments of drawing breath to tell our loved ones how much they’ve meant to us.

Well, guess what? None of the above happened to me. Because I recently had a near-death experience and it was terrifying and yet also disappointing.

It all began on a cold, crisp morning in the Sierra Nevada mountains. My my husband was driving and we were engaged in heated discussion over pine cones.

The debate started because I planned to harvest some ginormous Lake Tahoe pine cones and take them home to use for my holiday decor. My husband, who I guess suddenly thought he worked for the Department of Agriculture, was telling me that pine cones “can’t cross the California state line.”

I gave him some side eye which made him double down and say that at the very least, a suitcase full of pine cones would be subject to border inspection.

I thought this sounded improbable, but since we were in the mountains and cell signal was worthless, I couldn’t google, “Can pine cones cross state lines?” and shut down this idiocy.

Little did we both know that the controversy would soon be the least of our worries. Disaster lurked and it was only minutes away. Our conversation quickly changed from pine cones to “are we going to die?”

Our drive on the twisty California State Route 89 that went around Lake Tahoe had been fine. There had been some light snow, but the roads were clear — until we hit a patch of bad weather and the pavement became like an ice rink. This was especially frightening because parts of the road have no guard rails and you’re mere inches from a violent plunge down a 7,000-foot mountain.

Making matters even more desperate was that some drivers were in two-wheel-drive vehicles, and they were sliding right toward us, meaning that we could easily be pushed off the mountain by a 3 ton SUV.

But instead of telling each other I love you, we started arguing over whether our son was the sole executor of our estate. Perhaps, we debated, we set it up so that both kids were co-executors? In the middle of all of this, I texted our son and daughter and told them that our death was fast approaching and that they were the great joys and loves of our life.

Miraculously my husband managed to dodge sliding vehicles and we made it out alive. Once we had cell service I checked my texts and was underwhelmed by our kids’ response to their parents “leaving this mortal coil.”

My son texted, “Is this your way of telling me you didn’t rent a car with four-wheel drive?”

Not to be outdone, my daughter, I kid you not, texted, “I have Pilates till 12:45.”

WTH?

At this point, forget who’s the executor of our will. I wanted to change it and leave everything to our dog and cat.

When I questioned my children about their lackluster response, they both said that they knew we would be OK. My daughter, who’s really acting like she wants to be replaced in the will by the cat, wearily said, “Mom, it’s not like you’re not known for your exaggerations.”

OK, that’s a smidge accurate, but still: a Pilates text? I don’t know if I’m getting over that, ever.

Now as for those pine cones: Sigh, my husband was right.

Reach Sherry Kuehl at snarkyinthesuburbs@gmail.com, on Facebook at Snarky in the Suburbs @snarkynsuburbs, on Instagram @snarky.in.the.suburbs, and on TikTok @snarkyinthesuburbs and snarkyinthesuburbs.com.