Friday, December 28, 2007

The Miracle

Last Saturday, Nisha and I went to Minneapolis to spend the day with her friends at MOA. We woke up and set off early in order to avoid the predicted snowstorm. About 18 miles into Minnesota, a few miles past Albert Lea on Interstate-35, I began to feel the strong wind and wanted to slow down. I did, and simultaneously moved to the right lane. There was a truck about a hundred feet ahead of me, and a few cars the same distance behind me. As I shifted lanes, I felt the car sway… a little at first, and then suddenly… I lost control. I pressed down on the brake and tried in vain to maneuver the steering wheel as I helplessly watched my front windshield blur as the car swung dangerously back and forth between lanes a few times before suddenly careening off the road and into the median. I think I must have ceased to breathe for what seemed like a very long time before the car suddenly stopped.

A quick look showed me that Nisha was fine, and I felt no pain myself. It did not seem like we had struck anything. How pitiable it is, as I think about it now, that my very next thought was: ”Dear God! How much is this going to cost me?” As the car flew off the road, I remember seeing the truck ahead of me, and a post in the median. I was sure I would hit one of the two, but I hadn’t. It is nothing short of a miracle that there was no damage to anyone or anything. How the car managed to not hit anything God alone knows! I got out of the car… and walked around it, there wasn’t any body damage - we just were stuck in a foot of snow. In the 17F cold, Nisha and I tried digging the car out. But eventually we sobered up and called roadside assistance. I was scared out of my wits the half hour we were in the median that another vehicle would spin off the road and hit our stationary car and that we would not be able to do anything about it. I even made Nisha get out and sit in the back of the car. She tried to protest, but I would have my way! Anyway, no such catastrophe occurred. We went to Minneapolis and returned without any further untoward happening. Thank God!

3 comments:

Olivia said...

Thank God ... we both are safe no re...

I am happy !

Jerry Waxler said...

I love your blog, such clear and intimate self reporting. Keep notes. You'll write a beautiful memoir someday.

(I found this blog by googling for "I am nobody" by Emily Dickenson which I found as the inscription on a memoir I'm reading by Jancee Dunn).

Congrats on your Master's thesis, surviving your near accident, and your writing.

Jerry
Memory Writers Network

Azalea said...

Thank you Mr. Waxler! That is indeed a very lovely compliment :-)