A Difficult Post to Write

Three years ago today, I didn't die.

That was my first thought today, when I woke up and wandered to the hallway and turned my dial calendar to say "March 7."  Today was the 3-year anniversary of my near-death car wreck, which by an utter miracle my friend and I escaped from relatively unscathed.

This post isn't meant to be overly dramatic or depressing.  But nothing really stood out today otherwise, and this seemed worth noting.

You'd think after three years, I'd stop being haunted by it...but somehow, it still creeps up on me.  When it's raining/snowing and I have to drive, when I'm laying in bed and can't sleep, whenever car insurance commercials think that a sudden crash scene is a good sales technique.  I can't seem to escape it somehow...not really.

When I remember that day, I remember that the first emotion that my friend and I had upon emerging from the totaled car was absolute joy...we were laughing, joking, yelling "praise God" at the top of our lungs.  Our positivity probably confused the assortment of people who had shown up to help...it wasn't until later that both of us broke down.  It wasn't until we saw them towing the crushed car out of that ditch, up the snow-covered hill, that we really realized the magnitude of the situation...a realization that recurred for months as I continued to find bits of glass among my possessions, and continued for the next 2 years as I drove by that spot regularly on my trips from St. Louis to Lexington.

In a lot of very real ways, I want to be able to fully escape from that situation.  I remember those few moments more vividly than a lot of things.  But, at the same time, I wish that I could just distill it down to that moment when I got out of the car.  That moment when I was filled with a gratefulness to God for the gift of life, and for extending mine a bit longer...the certainty I had in that moment that God had a plan for my life that extended beyond March of 2008.  A confidence that God was going to do great things in me and through me.

How strange that I constantly let the normalcy of life stomp that feeling out of me.

There is a crucifix hanging from the rear view mirror of my current car.  My mom and I found it abandoned in the parking lot of the Hamburg Wal-Mart, and I picked it up and kept it, thinking it inappropriate for it to be lying forgotten on the ground.  I'm not sure what I did with it then...I'm fairly certain I just set it in a cup holder or tray of some sort.  Months later, when my parents were cleaning out the remains of my crushed and snow-filled car, my dad found it again, and asked my mom what it was - of course, she recognized it, and gave it back to me.  As small as it was, the reappearance of that cross at that moment was a strong reminder of God's protection, and how He continues to watch over my life in difficult times as in easy times.

When I got my new car the next fall, I took a red ribbon from some piece of AOII paraphernalia, looped it through the link at the top of the cross, and tied it from my mirror.  It still hangs there - a daily reminder of the power of God's love and the love of the sisters who helped get me through one of the roughest patches of my life, and who continue to do support and encourage me on a daily basis.

This is love.  This is life.