by Fred Moleck
Miracle on 495–66
Last Saturday I drove to northern Virginia to be part of my nephew’s fiftieth birthday celebration. The half-century mark in anyone’s life is significant and worthy of reckoning on “What is life?”On my way there I planned to stop to visit Carol and John, who live in a part of Maryland adjunct to the District of Columbia.
This journey was part of my yearly trek to their house to harvest boxwood from one of their twelve boxwood trees.
We’ve been friends for about thirty years now. They are always welcoming when I appear with unused garbage bags waiting to be filled with healthy, deep-green boxwood branches.
My yearly proclamation is “Christmas wouldn’t be Christmas without a spruce tree, three crèche scenes scattered throughout the house, and boxwood displays on the mantle, door, and anywhere else that needs it.”
The tradition is one of give and take. They give it to me, and I take it with glee and gratitude.
After the ritual of filling of the bags, John and I went inside, proud of our labors as hunters and gatherers.
I used their guestroom to clean myself up before I began my journey into northern Virginia.
You need to know that the route I take is 495, the infamous Beltway around Washington, which bears close to a hundred thousand vehicles in the course of one day.
From 495, I exit onto 66, the main avenue into northern Virginia, one of the most densely populated areas in the United States, if not the world.
When I left John and Carol, it began to snow, twilight was turning into night, and all those people who live in northern Virginia were making their way home on 495 and 66.
I was in the middle of it all. Needless to say, I was more than tense—I was like a rattlesnake on amphetamines.
I don’t like driving at night especially on interstates like 495 and 66. Couple that with snow, I was challenged not to engage into auto crunching.
After about fifty minutes, I was getting closer to the exit to take me to the birthday bash.
At this point I’m hearing a car horn sounding not too far from me. I paid no attention. It continued to beep.
What flashed through my mind was that the driver was beeping the horn to signal me that something awful was happening under my car, like flames or a busted axle or a wheel ready to fall off.
The car whose driver was beeping me saddles up to my side of the car. The driver puts the window facing my open window. The driver is John, whom I left fifty minutes ago.
We pull over into the emergency lane. He hurries over to me and hands me my overnight bag, greeting me with, “Here. And your medications are inside.”
I was speechless.
I mumbled something to him asking how he found me in the snow, the night, and a hundred thousand drivers.
He said something like, “I’m good!” A new superhero was born.
Do you realize what the odds are to have someone track a 2000 Chevy Tracker on the Washington Beltway and Interstate 66 in heavy traffic with annoying snow falling and finding me?
I deem it a miracle. I deem it a divine intervention. I deem it God saying to me, “You just think you’re in charge.”
It’s a good lesson for all of us at this time of year. Do your ministry, but don’t forget: God is in charge from the very beginning.
“In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. . . . And the Word became flesh and lived among us” (John 1).
You can reach Fred Moleck via email at fmoleck@comcast.net