00:00:20
Let me tell you a story, a story that happened to me.
Settle in and get cozy, but leave a light on.
Cause this ain't no fairy tale.
This ain't no happy ever after, either.
This is a story that'll keep you up at night and stick with you long after it's over.
Maybe it'll leave you feeling just like it left me: rattled.
00:01:15
I was seventeen years old. I was a senior in high school. I had my license.I had a job.
I had my whole life ahead of me. Things were great.
On weekends when I wasn't working, my best friend and I would go out and go shopping or drive around town, and we had a great time.
This day was like any other.
You have to understand that I was the oldest of seven children, and my family had a lot of love, but not a lot of funds.
00:02:04
My first driving experience was driving a 15 passenger van.
My daddy never bought a new car-or a gently used car, either. He would purchase cars that had a couple hundred thousand miles, cars that were literally on their last leg and needed repair or serious mechanical work in order to run safely. He'd fix them up so they would run for a couple of years, and he'd run it into the ground. Then, he'd sell it to a junkyard for five to $700, and he'd do it all over again. So growing up, we had cars that were 15, 20 years old.
My daddy had recently purchased this Oldsmobile Achieva. It was red and it had a little moonroof. He bought it for next to nothing. It had been sitting in a garage for a really long time and had very low miles compared to every other vehicle we ever had-I think it had less than 25,000 miles on it-and it was at least 15 years old.
This car had a problem. It would stall. So you'd be driving, and you'd be at a stoplight, and then you would press the gas pedal to go, and nothing would happen.
It had happened to my mama a couple of times, and it had happened to me. It was really scary. So, my daddy said he was going to fix it. And to be honest with you, I was a little bit nervous about driving it, knowing that it had stalled on me a couple of times. But he had said it was safe, and it had not had that stalling issue since he had fixed it.
And I'm 17 years old. I have the choice between a 15 passenger van and a cute little red car. Even though the car was old, by most people's standards, that was the coolest thing in our driveway. So obviously, I chose the car over the van.
It was a beautiful fall day, and I got permission from my parents to go pick up my best friend who lived about ten minutes away.
00:05:11
We had a whole girl’s day. We went shopping and we went to lunch. We're just having a good ol’ time. We finished at the restaurant and decided to go to the next place.
We got in the vehicle, I was driving, she was in the passenger seat, turned up the music.
I remember pulling out of the restaurant. I took a right, and got into a left lane. Ahead of me, there was an intersection that crossed an old highway.
And while I was sitting at the light, I looked to my right and I happened to notice that there were people on the railroad track.
00:06:24
And I could not get a good glimpse of them, but I could clearly see it was about half a dozen, half a dozen people. They were all dressed in white. They were very, very tall, maybe seven and a half feet tall? unusually tall. And there was a sense of urgency.
00:06:46
They were pointing. There was somebody with what looked like a notebook.
It was very out of place.
00:06:52
I mean, this is a tiny town in the south.
00:06:55
They did not fit the scene or the setting. The moment that I was going to ask my friend, “hey, what are those people doing over there?” The light changed and I returned my attention to driving.
00:07:15
I got into the middle of the intersection, no problem.And then I went to clear the intersection and the car stalled.
I pressed the gas and nothing happened.
00:07:36
I pressed the gas again, nothing happened.
We had a green arrow, and then, the arrow changed to a yellow blinking warning light. I looked straight ahead of me and it was a pretty far distance, but there was a semi truck coming toward the intersection, and he was going to
have to cross the railroad tracks before he cleared the intersection.
00:08:07
So I thought, well, hopefully he'll slow down for those railroad tracks and then he'll see me and it'll be fine.
This all happened so fast, but it felt like there was a lot of time to think through these scenarios. In that moment, I pressed the gas a third time and again, nothing happened. I looked up again across the intersection and I realized that truck was speeding, going probably 50, 55 miles an hour.
00:08:43
And they didn't look like they were slowing down for the railroad tracks that were coming up at all.
I got really nervous. I pressed the gas again, nothing happened.
I couldn't back up and I couldn't go forward. And we're in the middle of an intersection and there is this semi truck carrying gasoline barreling toward me and my best friend.
You know, they say when you're in a life or death situation, that time slows down. And I've been in a number of these, and I can say that for me, that's true. In that small amount of time, I had all the time in the world to think about my life, to think about my best friend.
I realized I was in a situation that I could not get us out of, and I was completely helpless and completely powerless to do anything in this moment.
And I felt horrible that here I am, not only probably going to lose my life, but my best friend is going to lose hers too. We wouldn't be in this situation if I had chosen a different car.
I had all of these thoughts come through my head while I was watching this semi truck get closer and closer and closer.
The truck barreled across the railroad tracks and never slowed down, didn't slow down at all.
They didn't beep at us. They didn't blow their horn. They didn't slow down.
They didn't do anything.
00:10:44
They maintained their speed, and I knew this was it. In a few seconds, it would all be over.
I could not bear to watch. So, I closed my eyes and I put both hands on the steering wheel, pressed the gas one more time,
and then, all of a sudden, I felt a push from the back of the car.
I opened my eyes, and I could see in the rear view mirror that the truck had missed the back bumper by maybe a half an inch. And it barreled on, speeding like it never saw us. And my car coasted through the intersection, like there was no problem at all.
I don't know logistically how this was possible. The 18 wheeler was a few feet from us, and then suddenly it was behind us. There's no way that the truck should have missed us, even if the car had gone when I pressed the gas pedal. It was an old vehicle, and it's not like it went from zero to 60 in a second or less.
And so at the very least, it should have hit the backseat.
But we were completely untouched.
There wasn't a scratch.
I drove a block or two and pulled into the next parking lot and sat there with my friend.
00:12:38
And we looked at each other. I said, Are we still alive? Did we die? Are we ghosts?
It was so surreal to be sitting there with my best friend, that I, just a few moments ago, was sure that that was the end for us.And then to be completely fine!
As we went through that intersection, and I had seen the truck completely missing us…
When I looked in my rear view mirror, I also happened to look back at the railroad track and those dozen people in their white business suits were gone.
Not a trace.
Now, I'm not sure what happened that day.
I think you could take it a lot of different ways. Maybe we were just lucky and the car suddenly roared to life at the last second. Maybe there's something to be said for the whole theory of parallel universes, or timelines.
00:14:15
You know, if we're all living in a simulation, a certain version of me and my best friend somewhere are no longer existing.
Or maybe, all those tall beings were there looking out for me and my friend.
00:14:33
Maybe there was a little bit of Divine intervention.
00:14:39
And I don't know, but I'm really glad that our parents didn't bury us that day.
At least, not in this timeline.
