Scary Moments

There are a few times in my life when I knew some guardian angels were watching over me.

***One night when I was 20 years old I was out on a walk with Mel. We were on a bike path and it was very dark outside. Suddenly, in the distance we heard a motor start. It was too dark to see what it was or how far away it was. A few seconds later I saw movement rapidly coming toward us. I grabbed Mel’s arm and yanked her off the path a split second before a truck flew by.

Later, police found the teenage boy who was driving the truck. He said he didn’t turn on the lights because he was hiding from some friends. He sped down the bike path because he thought they were coming from the other direction and he didn’t see us. I walked away with only some scraped up knees.

***When I was 16 years old Mel and I left her house to walk across the street to the high school. She lived on State Street in Salt Lake. The cars were speeding by when finally I thought there was a break in the traffic. I went to run across the street and stepped one foot over the white line when a car rushed by, coming so close that it hit my arm.

There was an RV to the side of me which had blocked my view. The driver slammed on his brakes after he hit my arm to see what had happened. Because of the limited view, he hadn’t seen me either. If I had been a few inches farther I would have been crushed by a car going 45 mph. That makes you think about life a little differently.

***Another guardian angel moment happened yesterday. I was driving to work and noticed my car acting strange. I stopped at a gas station to put air in the tires and saw that a front tire was completely worn down and I could see the metal thread popping out. There was a rip in the tire and I didn’t know how it was staying inflated.

We dropped the car off at the mechanic who later told Mel that he was surprised the tire hadn’t blown out between our house and his shop. The scary thing is that the day before, I drove with my brother-in-law and Jackson to Parowan to take some pictures of the changing leaves. I had driven more than 200 miles on the freeway. It’s unsettling to think of what could have happened while we drove down the road.

I’m thankful someone was watching out for us.