Wrecking Gators

I had a brush with death this morning.

Well, that might be a slight exaggeration, but I'm not one to exaggerate. Ever.

Today was our district cross country meet, and a coach from one of the other schools and I were in charge of parking at the stadium and driving two of the Gators over to the park. I had to do it last year, too, so I wasn't too worried about it.

When we got to the park, we were asked to drive the course and fix all of the markers that had blown down overnight. The other coach hopped in my Gator, and off we were. It took kind of a long time, but it was also kind of fun. It's a hilly course, so the Gator got a little adventurous out there. We were almost finished with the entire course, and everything was going smoothly.

And then the backstretch happened.

There is a part of the course with about 600 meters left where the path gets really narrow between a fence and some trees. I had gone around the trees and outside of the path on one really thin part, but then it appeared I would fit through the next scape. The other coach agreed, so I stayed on the path. But, for some reason, my depth perception was a bit off this morning, and I was too far to the right. Suddenly I felt a huge impact, and the next thing I realized was that the Gator was stuck in the fence. I had crashed us. I felt a throbbing in two of my left fingers and turned to the coach in the passenger seat—the side that crashed into the fence.

I was still able to coach.

I was certain I had killed him.

I immediately turned to ask him if he was OK. Thankfully, he was fine. I looked down at my fingers, and they were already black and blue and starting to swell pretty badly. I really wanted to be a baby and cry, but my tear ducts don't work very often. I managed to back out of the fence I had just splintered but then had to pause for a second. I just sat there staring at my fingers, and the other coach asked me if I wanted him to drive the rest of the way. (I'm sure he didn't want me behind the wheel any longer.) I told him I could drive the rest of the way, and we made it back to the start/finish safely, while my fingers continued to grow in size and get darker.

Now, I'm not one to overreact to anything—EVER—but I was certain I was going to have to get my fingers amputated. My mind had already started planning how I was going to live the remainder of my life without my middle and ring fingers on my left hand. I immediately realized I would never be able to get married since I wouldn't have a ring finger.

Like I said, I never overreact.

I've never been in a car wreck, and I definitely never want to experience one. That Gator incident was certainly enough. It was a reminder that sometimes we're not as in control as we think, and what we thought was a good path to follow isn't exactly the wisest choice. Had I gone left, a certain wooden fence would be a bit prettier, I wouldn't have lost two fingers (actually, they didn't have to be removed), and I wouldn't have freaked out a poor coach who had never even ridden in a Gator before today. (Hey, life is all about experience, right?) At least I was able to back up and try again.

Good news: the second attempt was much more successful.

We all get to make decisions every day in life, and every once in a while we're going to crash and burn when we take the wrong paths. But, thankfully, sometimes we get second chances.

Thank God for grace.