God Drives a Tow Truck (2 page)

When I arrived safely home two hours later, I told my family and relieved husband about the tow truck. I told them how the car had flipped, and the fenders had all been bashed in, but this mysterious tow truck had helped me and then vanished … mysteriously disappeared. They were all so happy to see me that they didn’t question me further, but sent me to bed, glancing sideways at each other.

“Did you hit your head?” they asked.

My husband went outside the next morning to examine the car. He could find no evidence of it having flipped, and said there were some scratches, but it did not look like the wheel wells had been damaged either. Then he looked at me as though I had lost my mind.

“This car did not roll over,” he said. I looked at the car in wonder. I know the car had crashed, flipped, and then the tow truck was there. And then it was not. My neck ached, and by the end of the day, it was clear I had whiplash. The doctor listened to my story, nodding, as he adjusted a neck brace.

“Did you hit your head?” he asked.

Many years later, when I had become a Christian, my sister called me and told me to turn on a radio program. “Now!” she commanded.

I did, and listened with amazement as a couple told a story of their crash on an icy road and how they were rescued by a tow truck. The tow truck driver never asked for any money, and when they drove away, and glanced in their rear view mirror, the tow truck had disappeared.

When I remember this story, which I would not believe if I had not been there, I still get goose bumps. I understand, now, that all those years when I was asking God, “If you are real,
show
me”, maybe He
had
been. I hadn’t been looking for Him in a tow truck. Who would imagine He would have the time? But what a
perfect
occupation for the Savior and Creator! What better image could He have invoked than a heavenly tow truck driver, who drags away the wreckage of shattered lives and despairing souls, to a place of refuge and safety? It really is not surprising at all that I met God on a day He was driving a tow truck. I suspect it is one of His favorite jobs.

Chapter Two

Goldie

Psalm 6: 9

⁹
The LORD has heard my cry for mercy;
   the LORD accepts my prayer.

It is a little embarrassing to admit that my best friend through much of my childhood was a keychain. In my defense, it was a very special keychain. Her name was Goldie. I still have her, in a little silver box of childhood treasures. She is nestled in an ancient Wilkinson Sword razor box made of shiny silver and lined with blue velvet. My dad gave me my treasure box over forty years ago. Inside are all the priceless riches of childhood: a little tin gun with a working trigger, a little heart shaped stone I found on Valentine’s Day, a real coin with a hole in the middle, a tea bag paper with the fortune “
you will be happy in life
”, an Indian penny, and Goldie.

We lived across the street from a large vacant lot. My dad was a sales manager, and we moved every three or four years. That was not nearly long enough for a shy introvert to make friends, so I developed a whole host of playmates in the vacant lot. My favorite was a large piece of driftwood that looked exactly like a horse to me. It had a saddle shaped depression in the middle and it rocked when I sat on the saddle. I named it “Camelot” and we had great adventures together. Quite often, in the course of a typical afternoon, I was singlehandedly responsible for rescuing a whole village attacked by vicious bullies that called the townspeople names and tried to pull their hair. I would swoop in on Camelot, and with my little tin gun with the working trigger, I would frighten off every last one of the evil horde. Then Camelot and I would ride back, while the sunset tossed glorious colors behind the trees. I sang victorious songs like, “Somewhere over the Rainbow”, or “What’s it all about, Alfie?”, which at the time seemed appropriate.

There was a small creek that meandered through the vacant lot, and I loved to wander barefoot in the cool water looking for crayfish. They tickled my feet as they bounced off my toes. I watched them for hours, carefully stepping on the smooth pebbly bottom. On one of those excursions, something glinted in the sun beneath the water. I leaned down cautiously and gazed at it. It was a gold keychain. It looked just like real gold except for the reddish rust mark around one scratch. On the side sparkling in the sun was an imprint of a pair of hands praying.

Reverently, I lifted the gold keychain out of the water. I held it in my hand, the cool wet metal comforting in the hot summer sun. Flipping the keychain over, I read a verse stamped on that side. Now everyone but perhaps that seven year old child knows the verse that was stamped on the keychain. However, I had never seen it, and while I was not sure who or what God was, I suspected that He was sending me a message of perhaps even greater import than my treasured tea bag fortune of a happy life.

“
Dear Lord

Grant me the serenity

To accept the things I cannot change

The courage to change the things I can

And the wisdom to know the difference.

Amen.”

I would one day learn this was called the “serenity” prayer. However, at the time, I didn’t know that. I thought it was a message written just for me by the very hand of God. I named the keychain Goldie, and carried her in my pocket wherever I went, for many years. As I grew older, Goldie spent less and less time in my pocket, and more time in my silver treasure chest. However, she did bring me serenity. Many times in life, when I could not control the events that hurt me, the friends that rejected me, the awkward stumbling of a shy psyche… I would repeat Goldie’s verse.

I believed that God, whoever He was, had sent me Goldie. At that time, we were fairly new to the south, having recently moved from NY to Memphis, Tennessee. I was the only child south of the Mason Dixon line that did not go to church. Every Monday morning, the teacher would ask the class who had attended church that Sunday. I was the only student that did not raise my hand. I was mortified. I was painfully shy, and to be singled out in this way was more than I could bear. I began to have stomach aches, and did not want to go to school. My mother finally wrangled out of me the whole sad story, and in a fury, went to the school to demand they stop this harassment.

“But Mrs. Ceccherelli,” said the teacher, “I am not asking that she attend
my
church!”

“You should not be asking if she attends
ANY
church!” my mother fumed. However, her protests fell on deaf ears. The teacher, and then the principal could not understand my mother’s concern. Fearing her interference would end up in other torments directed towards me, my parents decided that the only choice was to attend church. We joined a Unitarian church.

This probably would have boiled the liver of the teacher had she asked, but she never asked where I went to church when I began raising my hand with the other Godly children. It was enough that I was now attending
some
church.

I loved church. The Unitarians don’t really seem to care what people believed, and God was never mentioned as far as I recall, but the sanctuary had a huge plate glass window overlooking the Mississippi river. The pulpit was conveniently situated right in front of the window. I would sit transfixed watching the barges roll by endlessly on the wide, muddy waters. I don’t remember the pastor at all. For all I knew, he too spent the hour gazing out the window watching the muddy Mississippi glide by. I always left church deeply refreshed in spirit, Goldie jingling in my pocket.

It was not until over twenty years later that I finally came to believe in the God who had so gently planted Goldie in my midst. As I grew older and my troubles seemed at times more unbearable, I would still find peace in worshipfully creaking open the silver treasure box, and lifting Goldie out to read her comforting words.

When my son was going through a particularly lonely time in his life, I brought him Goldie. I told him how the prayer had been a great comfort to me in my many lonely years. I asked him if he would like her, to help him remember that we can’t always change things, but God can give us peace in the midst of struggle. He took Goldie, to my surprise. I felt a pang, as she had been such a part of my life for forty years.

When he went off to college, I found Goldie in a corner on his desk. I cupped the cool metal in my hand and smiled and tucked her away again in the little silver chest of cherished treasures.

Chapter Three

The Sacrifice of a Father and My Vision of a Cat

2 Corinthians 6:2

“Now is the time of God’s favor. Now is the day of

salvation.”

Some of the memorable visions of the Bible include chariots of fire, or wheeled animals with four heads, or dry bones coming to life and dancing in the desert. I join Elijah, and Ezekiel, and John, the beloved disciple, because I too, once had a vision. It is the only one I ever had, but I know it was real because it led me exactly where the vision claimed it would. It led me to my cat, but unfortunately, the vision must have been in a different time zone, and I was a half hour late.

I was animal crazy from birth. I cried when people stepped on ants. I rescued spiders from undeserved squashing, setting them free outside. I brought home endless strays. I even had a pet garter snake that lived under our front porch. My parents always found other homes for the strays. Finally, when I was nine years old, I was allowed to keep a cat. Being nine, I named him the highly clever name of Frisky, thinking it was unique. The brown tabby kitten was my joy and delight.

He grew to be an enormous cat, and an accomplished bird tormentor. One of his favorite activities was sitting on the roof, taunting the Blue Jays. He prowled near their nests, from the porch roof just outside my bedroom window. He stalked them, the tip of his tail twitching. When they noticed him, he froze and watched them, his tail thrashing more violently. Then he rumbled with a deep throated, “Meow!” and the Blue Jays flashed into the air and swooped at him. Driven to blue rage, they overcame their caution, and screeched at him, repeatedly dive bombing. Frisky retreated, beneath the slim overhang, and then stalked again, once the birds returned to their nests. When the Blue Jays became so incensed that their attacks were too persistent, too vigorous an onslaught, he yowled and scratched at my bedroom window. The screens had rips and small claw holes all over them. Laughing, I opened the window and he catapulted into the house. The Blue Jays cawed and continued their angry assaults until I slammed the window shut again. Then he lay at my feet, complacently cleaning his paws, as though he had not sacrificed a shred of dignity in the battle with the birds. I loved that cat.

Unbeknownst to me, my father was suffering greatly from Frisky. He had known he was allergic to cats when he agreed to let me keep Frisky, but had hoped that by limiting his contact with the cat, all would be well. However, he developed increasingly severe asthma, courtesy of Frisky. Seeing how much I loved the cat, he never told me, and I never knew how much he suffered until years later, after Frisky was gone. As a parent myself now, I realize children never really understand the depth of a parent’s love. The best we can do oftentimes is pay it forward.