Bumper cars in real life is not fun

I had my first car accident this week. Scary. Let me set the scene for you. I am driving to work. Beautiful morning. I am behind a red Mitsubishi. We come up to the street light right before the on-ramp to the freeway. Just as we approach, the light turns yellow. The guy in front of me makes every indication that he is going to go through it and onto the freeway...and so am I! Yeah!

However.

Then, he happens to look to his right and sees two police cars. He freaks and thinks he'll get pulled over if he runs the yellow light (even though everyone and their mom knows once your front tires make it over the line, you're fine. Right? Everyone knows that, right??). He had plenty of time to make the light and I had plenty of time to make the light. Heck, the car behind me could have made it too! Sorry, I'm ranting.

So.

He slams on his breaks. Not expecting this, I slam on mine and I proceed to have my first world-in-slow-motion experience. Have you ever had one? It's very strange. It was like in that .5 second amount of time, everything slowed down and I knew I was going to hit him and there was nothing I could do about it. My tires squeal, I skid, and them *BAM* I hit him forward just like in bumper cars. But this was real.

And this all happened in front of the cops.

Sweet.

So the cops come over to us and bring us into a nearby parking lot. The guy gets out of his car and we introduce ourselves with me constantly apologizing. Once the officers make sure we are ok, we start exchanging information and they take off. The guy's name was Matt and he was so cool. I think if he had been some raving lunatic shouting obscenities at me, I would have been crying. But Matt and I were both friendly and still in shock of what had just happened. Good combination.

Here's the good news: it could have been a lot worse. His car only has some scratches on the rear bumper and he said it's so old and has so many dents/scratches already he is just going to get a new car. So I don't have to pay for any of that damage. My front bumper has dents, scratches, a bent license plate, my hood is a little unaligned, and there's some red paint from Matt's car. BUT it could have been a lot worse. My car could have been totaled. My hood could be all scrunched up like an accordian. Our air bags could have gone off (it's a couple thou to stick those bad boys back in the steering wheel) or we could have had other people in the vehicles with us.

So now I've had my first car accident. I hope I never have another. They are scary. The bad news from all of this is I have whiplash. My neck and upper back hurt soooo much. I want to make an appointment to see someone, but I have to wait till Monday to see if I'm covered through my insurance.

What life lesson should I take away from this experience? Anticipate people breaking at yellow lights? Don't drive so close to cars in front of me? Only hit old cars to give their drivers excuses to buy new ones?