Someone is watching

[swimmase]

I feel as though I’m floating, rising up toward a surface that I can’t see but I know it’s there. Sounds permeate my ears as I continue to rise. There’s a sound like seatbelt buckles constantly being fastened and unfastened, like a whole airplane full of people getting up at once. There’s a hard metal versus plastic sound, not unlike that of one of those buckles hitting something. And there are voices – some urgent and loud, others quieter, but speaking very quickly.

&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp As I continue to fight my way up, I hear one voice above all the rest, calling out to me repeatedly, as if nothing were more important than the sound of my name, or maybe that I hear my name. I strain against the blackness that was holding me before. I see light above me, and I begin to feel my body. I’m lying on my back. I can sense commotion all around me, but I can’t see well enough to discern it. I try to sit up to see what is going on, but I can’t. I feel my muscles trying to respond, but my limbs aren’t moving. With horror I realize that I am strapped down. Panic sets in and I try to thrash about in an effort to be free, but it is to no avail. I try to scream, but my throat is clogged; I can’t even breathe!

&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp The voices around me get louder; apparently my commotion has aroused their attention, whoever “they” are. All of the sudden I feel something being ripped from my throat and out my mouth. I can breathe! I try to take a huge breath, but I choke on something. As I cough, I feel hands turn my head to the side, and I spit out what I’m choking on. The taste of blood fills my mouth. My eyes reluctantly begin to focus and I can make out a light above me, recessed into a smooth vanilla colored ceiling. Suddenly a face replaces the light, and I realize this is the face that is constantly calling my name. Once again I try in vain to move away from this place but my efforts are futile. The face is trying more urgently to get my attention.

&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp “Just calm down and you’ll be ok! Just calm down!” the face says.

&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp The room that I’m in begins to move and shudder. I hear the sound of an engine. I’m in a car? I try to speak to the face, to find out what’s going on but the words won’t come out. Finally my guttural noises take form, and I realize I’ve been speaking words the whole time I was trying to ask what was going on. My mind deciphers the question I’ve been repeatedly asking:

&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp “Are my precepts alright?” is what I’m saying over and over. Precepts? What are precepts? What’s going on? The face is trying to talk to me, something about an accident and a car. I try to force my brain to remember what happened to me last, before I wound up here, wherever here is. If I was in a car accident, I must have been driving. Was I driving? I can’t remember driving. As I try to make my mind work, I feel the darkness closing in around me again. I hear a new noise in the background, a rhythmic thump-thump-thump as I fall back away from the world.

 

[swimmase]

There’s light up above me again as I work my way back up to the surface. I’m still lying on my back, and I’m still strapped down. I feel my clothes being cut off me, and something else replacing them, and then I’m moving. Or actually whatever I’m on is moving. I see ceiling tiles and fluorescent lights above me. It seems like I’m being pushed down a hallway. As abruptly as the movement started, it stops and it appears that I’m in a large room. I try to sit up and pain shoots through my back warning me not to move. There’s a woman near me; I try to ask her what’s going on. I think I said it right this time. I can’t make out everything she says, but it sounds like something about a car falling on me. Then I’m pushed through a large hoop and my hands are strapped above my head. A voice tells me to hold my breath, and I take a deep breath against stabbing pains in my back and hold it for what seems like eternity. The voice finally tells me to exhale. As this process repeats itself, I force my mind to think back to what happened to me before I arrived where I am now. I have a vague recollection of being in the driveway of my friend’s house, and of intending to work on my car, but the memory is faint like a fog fading when the sun comes up.

&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp As the world around me becomes more vivid, I become aware of the sensation of pain coming from all over my body – my legs, spine, chest, and head all alternate between throbbing and stabbing pain. My brain digs up a few more scattered glimpses of memory. I recall taking the wheels off my car and getting to a part behind the wheel and brake assembly. I remember talking to my girlfriend as I clean grease off a part, but no matter how hard I try, I can’t bring up anything after that. And finally it hits me: my car must have fallen on me while I was underneath it.

&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp Instantly my mind races through possible injuries that I might have sustained. My back hurts – what if it’s broken?! I try to check to make sure my spine is ok by trying to move my feet – they move so that must be ok, but it feels like something is around my neck. What about my head? I could have sustained brain damage! I try to think of something difficult to test my mind and hit on calculus. I think to myself “the first derivative of x^3 is 2x^2 and the second derivative is . . . 6x!” I feel relief at having solved that. I still hurt but I don’t think anything vital is damaged.

&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp Finally I am removed from the giant hoop and rolled out of the room. The world around me is making much more sense. I’m lying on a bed being pushed down a hallway in a hospital somewhere. Finally I am pushed into what appears to be some sort of cubicle. A doctor comes in and tells me what I had surmised. My car must have come off the jacks somehow while I was underneath it, pinning me for at least ten minutes while neighbors and rescue workers tried to get me out. I was then flown to the hospital where I am now. The pain in my back was due to three ribs broken near my spine, the feeling of something around my neck was due to the c-collar that had been put on me, and my head hurt so badly because it had been trapped between the transmission of my car and the ground.

&nbsp &nbsp &nbsp &nbsp All of the sudden there are more people in the room – my girlfriend, her father, my friend, and his parents enter the room, looking very much relieved to find me alive, and seemingly amazed that I’m conscious and functional. They stay with me until a nurse takes me to a private room for the night. Once I am alone, my mind naturally works its way over the day. Prior to going out to try and fix my car, I had been listening to some music I had downloaded by a singer named Ani Difranco. One of the last songs I had listened to was called “What if no one’s watching” and asked if there really was a God watching over us. I remembered how I had initially been offended at the song but not though much of it. As I looked at how my day had turned out after hearing that song, I realized that even though the accident was horrible, I was more than just lucky. There were several events that had any one of them not happened, I almost certainly would have been killed.

First off, I had to convince my girlfriend to come outside and talk to me while I worked under my car. She had intended to stay inside. Had she not come outside, I would have been alone at the time of the accident. Secondly, I was in the best possibly position to be in for the accident. I was lying on my side reaching across my body, as opposed to being on my back. Therefore when the care came down onto me, my body was able to compress across my shoulders and expand out my chest and back. It’s not a pleasant thing to think about, and that’s how my ribs got broken, but had I been on my back and not my side, my body would not have been able to disperse the force and protect my lungs and heart. And the final event that sticks in my mind is that although many neighbors came over, they were not able to lift my car off of me. It wasn’t until a policeman showed up with a jack in the trunk of his car that they were able to lift the car off me. Even more amazing was that the policeman hadn’t planned on having the jack in his car – he had intended to take it out that morning and leave it at his house but had forgotten about it.

As I thought about those events, I realized I had a very clear answer to Ani Difranco’s question. There most certainly is Someone watching over us, and at any given point, we may be reminded of that. And even when you least expect it, you may become and instrument of God’s will. I’ve been able to thank a few of the people that helped me on that day, but most of all I thank God for the people he made into His instruments.

So to answer your question, Ani, God is not an idea someone put in my head. He is watching over us, and He took care of me when I needed Him most.

 

[joatamos]

im.. im lost for words.... wow

follow the flame