The Answer I Didn’t Know I Wanted

There we were on another Friday night. It was me, my girlfriend, her friends and a couple of other friends. We were juniors in high school just doing what high schoolers do, hanging out. And like a lot of teenagers, we thought we needed some alcohol to enhance the evening. 

Now, I come from the era before everyone had cell phones. So if you were going to call a ‘buyer’ from one of your friend’s parents houses you had to be discreet. And if you couldn’t get a hold of them or they didn’t show up on time at the designated drop site, well, you were out of luck. 

This particular Friday night was bitterly cold and early in the evening, a light snow started to fall. As the evening went on the snow started to fall more heavily. We were waiting in my car for the ‘goods’ to show up, but the later it got the more grim the outlook looked as far as the ‘goods’ being delivered. 

I’m not sure how much time passed but it started to get late and we all decided we’d better head our separate ways and went home. I had to take my girlfriend and two of her friends home and that’s where things went South. 

Let me set the stage. 

I had a 1972 Mustang Fastback with a 351 Cleveland motor. And I liked speed and screwing around. Everyone knows how fun it is to do donuts and fishtail in the snow. It was snowing hard too.

However, this night was different. As we were going around a curve close to the girl’s house we were going to, I asked her if cars were allowed to park on the street during a snow emergency. I was going to gas it so we’d fishtail and slide around the curve a little bit. She said she didn’t know, so to my regret, I didn’t do it. 

About that time I felt the car continue sliding straight even though I was turning to the right. Then all of the sudden, and I can still see it as clear today as when it happened, there she was. A giant Oak tree was right in front of me and I crashed right into it. 

I was knocked out briefly, my girlfriend’s friend hit the back of her seat and pushed her into the windshield shattering her nose. And the other girl twisted her ankle under my seat. They were all pretty minor injuries for the most part and everyone healed up just fine. 

I was the seventh car to hit that tree. Needless to say it’s gone now but I don’t know what took them so long to cut it down. 

The blessing in disguise was that we never got any booze. It was bad enough that I crashed into a tree. But it would’ve been ten times worse had I been drinking. 

I wasn’t praying that we’d get booze that night, although we did want it. But sometimes we don’t get what we pray for or ask for and it’s actually a blessing in disguise. So if you think God’s not answering your prayers just remember sometimes it’s not the answer you want. It’s still an answer though. 

To Jump or Not to Jump

I was working with my friend Mark and cousin Kerry one hot & muggy morning back in the summer of 1988. We were picking up the trash at an army guard camp about 30 minutes from home. 

We were almost finished working when we noticed the river on the East side looked a little too refreshing to pass up. So we pulled the truck over and took a short walk to the river bank. After all, we had earned a cooling off and were almost done working. 

Now this river is known to not be very deep. You can see sandbars for miles up and down the river. But we didn’t know how deep the water was right off the bank. And water is always moving faster than it looks. 

Our plan was to jump in, swim out to a sandbar, cool off and head home. But the current kept messing with us. “How deep do you think it is,” asked Mark. “I don’t think it’s very deep,” replied Kerry. “Should we go for it,” I asked. And then we’d stand there pondering what to do. We’d throw rocks in and try to touch the bottom with a stick but to no avail. Then we’d go back through the questions.  

After several minutes of pondering, and I mean several, probably twenty minutes, we decided to go for it. All the while the truck was idling because we weren’t going to be in the water very long. We nervously jumped in the water and started swimming to the closest sandbar. Then it happened. What we figured all along but weren’t 100% positive about was confirmed. After a couple of strokes our knees hit the bottom of the river. Then we started laughing about being so worried about how deep it was and getting swept away. So we stood up and walked the rest of the way out to the sandbar.  

All of the anxiety and worry about how deep the water was and getting swept away was for nothing really. We knew the river wasn’t deep but the doubt kept creeping in and then we would feed off each others doubt. Which made it even worse. But like most things it came down to risk vs. reward and reward won. We overcame our fear, went for it and had a great old time. Until we had to explain to my grandpa why we were gone so long. As typical teenagers we forgot that we had taken his car to work. But my cousin got blamed for that so no biggie. 

So the next time you really want something and you’re wondering if you can make it, wondering if you should go for it, but you know in your heart of hearts, your soul of souls that you can. That the fear and doubt is all in your head. Go for it. You won’t be sorry that you did. Even if you are there’s a lesson to be learned.