Survivor of a car accident that killed 2 friends, Williamsburg’s Robin Merritt shows her mettle
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There are no sudden flashbacks or jarring nightmares. Instead, the memory of that terrible day in Arizona floats permanently in Robin Merritt's thoughts, softened by the healing routine of everyday activities. She can drive over the Coolidge Bridge now without fear that vehicles coming the other way will veer across the line and crash into her car. She can walk, even hike. Most important, she can ride her horse, Red Hawk.
"Healing is an amazing process. It blew me away," Merritt, 23, said recently as she talked about her long journey back from two badly broken legs, a broken elbow, a lacerated liver and the psychological trauma of losing two friends in a car accident in June 2010 in Arizona.
"I'm so excited I can put my shoes and socks on. I have such an appreciation for what my body has done for me," said Merritt, who recently graduated from the University of Massachusetts.
Merritt, then 22, had traveled to the town of Coal Mine in Arizona, where she planned to spend several weeks racing horses bareback. Racing bareback was a new challenge, an extension of her lifelong love of riding. While she might make some prize money, the real reason she went is "it was the opportunity of a lifetime."
She had been there just three days, getting accustomed to the Arizona heat and to her hosts, the Nez family, who live on a Navajo Reservation. She and Devan Nez had gone trail riding that day, a glorious day that filled her with a sense of belonging. "I felt so at home with these people," she said. "Up until the last second, they were laughing."
The evening of June 10, she climbed into the back seat of a big Suburban along with Ambrose Nez, her employer. His uncle, Benson Nez, drove. Benson's son Devan also was in front. Police reports later would state that the driver of a stolen van, on a suicide mission, deliberately crossed the center line. It hit the car Merritt was in, flipping it several times. Benson and Devan Nez were killed, along with the van driver. She and Ambrose were severely injured.
Flown by helicopter from the Tuba City hospital to Flagstaff, where she faced emergency surgery, she listened as the surgeon explained her injuries. She asked if he could save her legs. "We're going to try," he said. The surgery, which involved inserting rods into her legs to stabilize and align the broken femur bones, was successful. "When I woke up and saw my legs were there, I was so, so happy," Merritt said.
Helping hands
Back home in Williamsburg, her parents, Phil and Diane, had received a phone call from the hospital. They absorbed the shock, then turned to figuring out what needed to be done.
Phil, a land-use architect, stayed home to mind the farm. By the time Diane got to Arizona her daughter had been moved to Prescott Valley rehab center, where she persuaded staff to put a cot in Robin's room. She spent the next five weeks there, helping her daughter dress, wheeling her outdoors for fresh air and making trips to the store to pick up postcards - Robin insisted on responding to the stacks of mail she received from family and friends back home.
Mother and daughter are cut from the same cloth: Diane taught science at JFK Middle School for 33 years, while her daughter weaves scientific verse into her poetry and has pursued a career path in animal science. They also share a deep sense of responsibility, resilience and a way of being steadfast through tough times.
"She faced death, saw friends die. She faced her mortality," Diane said. Still, Diane said, "She mainly wanted to press ahead. She didn't want to dwell on what happened. She wanted to concentrate on getting better. Her attitude was amazing to me. Here she was, so hurt, and she was never negative, never sad."
Robin asked Diane to attend Benson and Devan's funeral in her place. And so she went, arriving on a Coal Mine mesa in a rental car. She was the only white woman among Benson and Devan's grieving friends and family. "There I was, in my red Impala, Miss Whitey. Someone spoke to me, welcomed me," Diane said. They all stood together as father and son were laid to rest in handcrafted wooden coffins, lowered into a single, wide grave. Their saddles and bridles went into the grave, too, for their next journey. Their horses already had been put down, as is the custom.
A reckoning
In a way, Robin has been here many times, well-practiced from a number of injuries. "It's been a theme," she said, recalling breaking a leg on a trampoline when she was 3. "I learned at an early age, being hurt is not the end of the world. It's a matter of time. It's hard for us to give time to anyone, even yourself. But you have to."
Lying in bed for days on end, Robin pondered the ironies and coincidences around the accident. "So many crazy things," she said. When she was leaving the Williamsburg home she shares with her parents, a friend said to Diane Merritt. "Aren't you going to tell her to break a leg?" "No," her mother said emphatically.
"I told her I'd break two," Robin recalled with a smile, meaning that she intended to win her races.
Then there was the matter of the seat belt. Merritt, who always is reminding friends to buckle up, unbuckled her own seat belt the night of the crash. "It was the weirdest thing," she said. "It was the one time in my life I didn't have (a seat belt on.) I felt rather free."
In hindsight, she wonders whether that act saved her life, since she was able to dive down behind the seat when the collision occurred. Ambrose Nez threw himself over her. "He's a dad," Merritt said. "I think he was instinctively trying to protect me."
Five weeks and another surgery later, she boarded a plane and returned to the embrace of family and friends. One great joy was her reunion with Red Hawk, her horse, who came to her years ago, himself scarred mentally and physically by an accident and needing her gentle hand to soothe his fears. Now it was he who helped her. "He's usually skittish, but when he saw the wheelchair he came right over. He didn't care," she said.
"When I first got on him, in September, I'm sure he could feel I wasn't strong," she continued. "He took care of me. I have such a trust in him. It's like having an older brother."
Going back
No one recognized her when she walked back through the door at Mountain Valley Regional Rehab, Jan. 6 of this year, seven months later, returning just like she said she would.
"When the receptionist realized who I was, she just exploded," said Merritt, smiling. "I wanted to show the PTs their work, give them feedback. I wanted to say, 'This is who I am normally.' I wanted to give other patients inspiration. Going back helped."
She also visited Ambrose, who was healing. Then, since sometimes going back is a way forward, she returned to the spot where the accident occurred. "I needed to see that strip of road," she said. "I needed to see that it wasn't out to get me." She sat there awhile, absorbing all the shifting emotions. In the end, she said, "It was just a normal place. I'm no longer afraid of that location."
In May, Merritt walked onto the stage at the University of Massachusetts to accept her degree in animal science. She made the Dean's List. This summer, she traveled to Europe with a friend, a five-week celebration of life.
As her world eases back into balance, she's considering options. She might work with her sister, Betsy Merritt, 36, who started a business as a hoof-care specialist. Several weeks ago, she joined the Williamsburg Fire Department as a volunteer and hopes to gain valuable experience as a first responder. "I love helping people, especially in crisis," she said.
Though the weight of her ordeal is still with her, it is in its place now. "I so appreciate my ability to trust again," she said. "I can remove myself from that other person I was, and look at the world in a reasonable way."
