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So, it's December 23rd, 1988.
I'm 17 years old, I'm coming out of the record store,
my friend Pat sees me,
he asks me what's in the shopping bag I'm holding,
I tell him it's a concert T-shirt,
it's a Christmas present for Benji our friend,
and my best friend.
Pat looks at me a little funny,
and Pat's only 14 at the time,
but he's already cooler than I will ever be
in my entire life.
So when he looks at me like that I always pay attention.
Pat tells me that guys don't buy Christmas presents
for other guys.
And especially surprise Christmas presents.
He tells me that he's had girlfriends
for like six months and never bought them a thing.
So, for me to buy Benji
a Christmas present is a little odd.
I'm suddenly feeling very self-conscious
about the betta fish, in the backseat of my car,
that I bought at the Pet Store for Pat
like an hour ago. (crowd laughs)
And the comic books for Kooge,
and the sweatshirt for Tom,
and all the presents I bought for my friends.
(crowd slightly laughs)
And I know that Pat is right,
that it is strange that I've done this,
but it's been a long time since I've had a good Christmas.
My parents, my absentee...
The combination of my absentee mother,
and my evil stepfather, and their failing marriage,
and no money, has made every Christmas for years,
just a misery.
But for the first time in my life,
I have money in my pocket.
I'm a manager at McDonald's
making five dollars and 75 cents an hour.
I'm working full-time while I'm in high school,
and I am the richest person I know. (crowd laughs)
And so I am going to to use this money to buy myself
a great Christmas.
I'm heading home now I need to get my uniform,
'cause I have a shift at McDonald's later,
and I got to get these presents into the house.
It starting to snow out, it's kind of lovely.
I'm driving my mother's 1976 Datsun B210,
it's a car about the size of a box of Pop-Tarts.
(crowd laughs)
I'm coming around a corner, and I'm heading down a hill,
when my car starts to slide into the opposite lane.
I look up and I see a white Mercedes-Benz
coming right at me.
They say that in moments like this people,
time will like freeze for them or slow down,
and it is absolutely true.
In the three seconds it takes before our two cars
hit head on, I have exactly three thoughts.
The first is, "I'm not wearing my seatbelt."
And I always wear my seatbelt.
But in the excitement of buying Christmas presents,
and the rush to get home, I've forgotten
on the worst day of my life to forget.
My second thought is, in moments like this I've been told
to steer into the skid, but it occurs to me
I don't know what the hell that really means, (crowd laughs)
and I still don't know to this day.
And my third thought is just one sentence,
it's five words long and I say it aloud,
"This is going to suck." (crowd laughs)
And it does.
When our cars hit I'm thrown forward,
my head crashes through the windshield,
my chin catches the steering wheel,
and the entire bottom row of my teeth
come flying out into my mouth.
My legs come forward and my right leg becomes embedded
in the air conditioning unit down to the bone.
And my left leg hits the emergency release brake,
it knocks the handle off, but it skewers my left leg.
It's all over in a second.
And then shock descends upon me, and I feel no pain or fear.
I climb out of the car,
I'm sort of crumbled next to the car,
and the woman in the Mercedes gets out
and she's completely unharmed, until she sees me.
And then she vomits and passes out. (crowd laughs)
The first people to arrive at the scene,
it's a pickup truck full of teenagers,
and a kid about my age gets to me first
and he lies to me down in the mud in the snow,
he gives me a look over and then he says,
"Dude, you're fucked." (crowd laughs)
It is the most accurate medical assessment
that I will receive that day. (crowd laughs)
A police officer arrives, he puts a coat on me,
and I've got broken ribs so it feels like a thousand pounds.
I'm looking up at a white sky and the snow is falling,
and I eventually close my eyes.
When I woke up again, I'm in an ambulance,
there's a woman straddling my hips
and she is pounding on my chest, which is now on fire.
And there's a man trying to shove a tube down my throat,
and the woman starts screaming, "He's back, he's back."
And I'm wondering, "Who the hell is back?" (crowd laughs)
But it's me.
I find out later that my heart stopped beating,
and I stopped breathing for about a minute.
No white light. (chuckles)
When I get to the emergency room,
the doctors get to work on me right away,
they're picking out glass,
they're getting my legs ready for surgery,
they're wiring my teeth down.
A nurse comes over and ask me for my phone number,
and I give her my parents' number,
and then I give her the number for Trout McDonald's,
'cause I'm supposed to be working that night.
And she sort of scoffs at it,
but I say, "No like, I was dead 20 minutes ago,
"but that drive through does not run well without me,
"and they're going to have to get someone in." (crowd laughs)
And bless her heart, she calls McDonald's.
My parents, they don't show up.
I find out later that when they heard I was stable,
they go to check the car out first.
And I'm waiting for a surgeon because it's December 23rd
and they're hard to find.
And I'm waiting and I'm feeling alone,
but I'm not alone.
Because when I called McDonald's to tell them I was out,
those people started calling other people,
and the waiting room is now filling up
with 16 and 17 and 18 year old kids,
and one 14 year old boy.
And my friend Benji is the first one to arrive.
- [Speaker] Aww!
- And they can't come in to the emergency room to see me
'cause they're not family,
but they roll my gurney into the other side
of the emergency room, and they open a door.
And one by one, each one of my friends stands in the door,
and they wave and they give me the thumbs up.
And they say stupid things to make me laugh. (crowd laughs)
Benji never gets his concert T-shirt,
and Kooge never gets his comic books,
and the betta fish is the only casualty
of the car accident that day. (crowd laughs)
But it turns out that Pat is wrong,
'cause you can give your friends Christmas presents,
'cause they gave me the best one I've ever received.
They gave me family.
And until I meet my wife 15 years later,
they are the only family that I have.
And it turns out they're the only family that I need.
Thank you. (crowd applauds)