^V^   Christmas Night ~ Phoenix, AZ    ^V^

On Christmas night, I was hitchhiking where I lived in Phoenix, Az., which was fairly common 
back then, it was still in the hippie era.  A psychotic Vietnam vet picked me up, and as I got 
out of the car, he shot me in the back with a 22 (I still have the bullet in me, it's lodged 
against a rib).  Then he drove away, and I realized that I couldn't walk.  I sat up on the sidewalk, 
and looked down at my useless legs; I couldn't feel them at all.

While i was deciding that i should call for help, he came back.  He reached into his car and 
pulled out a huge knife, then began walking/lurching toward me.  (I found out later that he had 
been blown up in Vietnam, so he walked like one leg was shorter than the other because he had 
artificial hips).  He could tell that I couldn't get up from the sidewalk, and he started slicing 
into me .. not hacking, but cutting the skin, starting at my throat.  He was still in the act, 
he'd cut down my throat, one breast on the side, down to my abdomen when a plainclothes detective 
heard me screaming; he got there just as i was losing consciousness to stop the attack.  I had 
just stopped struggling because I had no strength left.  I lost about half of my blood I think, 
and my hands and fingers were all sliced up from grabbing at the blade.  So I was going through 
that doorway, I laid my head on the sidewalk and started to go when the car drove up and stopped. 
I stayed awake, because it kept me conscious.  If he had been 2 or 3 minutes later, I don't think 
I would have woken up.  I looked at the car as it pulled up and stopped; he was still on top of me 
and he stopped stabbing me then.  My only thought was, please let them have a gun.  The man got 
out of the car, stood up and said, "Don't move or I'll blow your head off, I'm  a cop!"

He walked over to us, and I knew he thought I was already dead.  I waited until he got close 
enough to hear me, then I said, "Thank you for saving my life."  He got an angry look on his 
face and kicked the man off of me with his foot.  Then other cops arrived and then the 
ambulance.  I stayed awake until they put me out for surgery in the hospital

The attacker had the 22 he shot me with in his car as well as an over & under shotgun, and all kinds of 
lovely saws and cutting instruments in the car.  He told the detective that he had intended to cut me 
up and eat me.  He was later found incompetent to stand trial, and he was put away in the state mental
hospital in Phoenix, Az.  I recently found out that he got out 3 years later, which is not unusual in 
cases of attempted murder, I believe, when the person is judged incompetent.  He lives in Philadelphia 
now; I found his phone number and his address on the internet.  What bothers me most is knowing that he 
must have killed others since this happened.  Once a serial killer progresses to the point of acting on 
his fantasies, they never stop.  But I'm sure that he learned from the mistakes he made with me; he won't 
get caught again unless he does something very stupid.  I would love to find out if he has been charged 
with any crimes since he got out of the state hospital in phoenix; but getting hold of that kind of 
information costs money.


Today, all I have to show for it is the scars, which don't show up much on my fair skin, and some stiff
fingers because of the scar tissue on my hands from grabbing at the knife blade.  But if the bullet had 
gone in the slightest fraction over, it would have hit my spine dead center instead of just on the edge, 
and I'd be in a wheelchair now.  It's really a miracle that I'm here, and that I'm not crippled.  As it 
was, my leg hurt agonizingly for several weeks because of the nerve damage; it felt like it was on fire 
all the time.  It atrophied to almost half the size of the other one, and i t was two weeks before I 
started putting weight on that leg, and then walking, a little more every day.

A bullet is white-hot and sterile when it goes in.  Mine is not dangerous where it is, since it's lodged 
against a rib; so it would be silly to have surgery to remove it.  Actually, most of the time I forget 
it's there, until I see an x-ray; then I'm wondering, what is that white blob?  Then I remember ... 

I'm going to expand on the story of my brush with death, and how it changed me, and put it on a 
webpage, probably a private one, by invitation only.  I think it's a story worth telling, since I 
learned on a very deep level that death itself is not horrible, even under the most terrifying of 
circumstances (such as being shot and repeatedly stabbed to death).

There was a part of me that felt sad about dying so soon.. I felt, oh no, not again, not yet, not when 
I'm so young, with so much ahead of me.   The feeling of having died before was very strong, and so 
real.  I've always wished that I had past life memories.