Time Dilation

(excerpt from Lenses, a book-length collection of essays, looking for a pulbisher)

In the summer of 2012, driving back to Boston from Cape Cod, I came close to death.
I was alone, driving a van packed tight with stuff we had brought to the Cape for a two-week vacation. My wife, Barb, was cleaning the cabin and would be following in our other car in about an hour.
Three miles from the Sagamore Bridge over the Cape Cod Canal, I realized that my brakes didn;t work at all.
The traffic around me was travelling at 60 miles an hour. The distance between me and the car in front of me was a car length. The car behind me was also a car length away. There were cars to the right of me as far as the eye could see. To the left of me there was a metal barrier.
The car ahead of me slowed. I gently tapped my brakes. Nothing happened. I tapped again quickly. Nothing. There was no resistance to my foot pressure. Now I was just a couple feet away from the car in front of me. I stomped down on the brake peddle, and the peddle went all the way to the floor with no resistance and no change in speed.
Fortunately, the car ahead picked up speed. We were going downhill. I was coasting.
Options rushed through my mind.
I tried to downshift, but the gears were locked.
I considered using the emergency parking brake. But if I stopped suddenly, the car behind me would slam into me and I'd end up in a pile-up.
I considered turning off the ignition. But the van I was driving had power steering. If the engine turned off, the power steering would shut off as well.
After what felt like an hour but probably was less than a minute, around a curve, the hill ended and I found myself on a slight incline. Then, a grass median strip opened up to my left. I turned left onto the grass and the car started slowing down. In what felt like another hour but was only a few seconds, the car came to a stop, a few hundred yards from the bridge.
My heart was racing. I saw the van, the grass, the road, the traffic, the beautiful blue sky with a clarity I had never seen before. My mind was muddled, but I was feeling ever so high, so relieved. I was alive. I had never before felt so much alive.