Angel Overtime

In the category, "what if?"

What if my guardian angel had not been looking after me and my loved ones

...on the way home from high school swim practice with a carpool of teammates, when the windows fogged up because we were all wet and it was cold outside, and a semi-trailer truck took the side mirror off as I tried to merge too far over getting onto the freeway because I couldn't see? [1982]

...when I was trying to park on the edge of a cliff outside one of the monasteries at Meteora in a standard that I didn't quite know how to drive and nearly couldn't get into reverse? [1987]

...on the way to the airport to fly with my husband from London to Chicago to take up my first job, when I drove into some smoke and suddenly there was a car stopped in front of us, smoking? [1994]

...on the way from North Carolina to Texas, as my family and I were going over the Appalachians in the rain and a semi-trailer truck nearly took the side mirror off as I changed lanes? [1998]

...on the way from Amarillo to Chicago, on I-40 just out of Shamrock, when I tried to brake on the ice to avoid yet another semi-trailer truck and we spun round and off the road, totaling our car by skidding backwards over a ditch in the snow? [2008]

...on the way to practice the other day when I thought that the car in front of me had stopped because the green light at the intersection just down the block from where I live was broken and so I snuck round it to turn left, only to find that the car had stopped because there was an ambulance on the way? [2009]

Truly, it's good to be alive.

[Footnote, by way of explanation: I am actually a very cautious driver. From the above list, you will understand that I do everything I can to avoid changing lanes more than I have to. I also don't like driving on the freeway very much. But the point of the list was not to convince myself to sell our car or stop going to practice just because it's a dangerous world out there. It was to remind myself to be thankful that things had not gone otherwise in each of these incidents because they so easily might have.]

Comments

  1. Bear, I think I see a pattern here. Have you considered restricting yourself to public transportation? You know, just in case the angel ever takes breaks?

    ReplyDelete
  2. I am stunned by the fact that every single incident on your list involves driving. Or is it a special driving-related list?

    ReplyDelete
  3. @ Rina: It's a special, driving-related list.

    @Badger: I don't think I want to know about the near misses I've had on airplanes. But the point of the list was to show how many times in our life things might have gone differently. Only one of these incidents actually involved an insurance company and the road was really, really icy.

    ReplyDelete

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