I am almost home now. Wow, what a day! I've almost managed to get that guy out of my head, the guy in the parking lot. One of my 'Soul-Blues' melodies is blaring on the radio and I'm loving it! The music is slowly filling my soul with calm. My crazy, scary, invigorating, chaotic afternoon memories are slowly drifting away, being replaced with thoughts of an early dinner.
Static . . . "BREAKING NEWS!" . . . .static . . . "BREAKING NEWS!" . . . the radio broadcast continues . . . "A deadly tornado has touched down in Clinton County within the past 30 minutes! Apparently, a large tornado. . .. with reports of casualties, along with devastating damage to property!" My heart skips a beat. What? Where? Oh my God! That's my County! . . .My Baby! Oh, Please God!!?? I can feel my foot pressing down on the gas pedal. My car accelerates. The radio broadcast continues . . . "We are only receiving a few details at this point. A large tornado struck just minutes ago, just inside the town of Concord, with extensive damage to the populated housing development of Meadow View." NO, NO! That's where my babysitter lives . . .My Baby! . . . . static . . . "What we know at this point is that there are casualties."
I am just two minutes from the apartment, from my babysitter, from my Baby. How could I have wasted precious minutes earlier talking with a stranger in a parking lot? Wasting time! Time stolen from being with my Baby! What if . . . .
I make the sharp right turn into the parking lot. I can't believe what I am seeing! I see tree limbs, furniture, glass, scattered everywhere! I feel the blood rush from my legs. At the same time my adrenaline starts speeding through my veins. My eyes are frantically scanning the parking lot for my babysitter, for my Baby!
The EMS crew has already established an emergency medical area, a Triage, in the parking lot! What is that under those white things? Are those 'People'? Are they 'Dead'? Are those 'Bodies'?!! On the verge of hysteria now, I begin to run in circles!
Someone grabs my arm. I turn to see my babysitter, Ellen. She's holding my Baby! I lunge for them. I hear myself screaming. "Oh My God! Are you OK?" She nods, my Baby cries. We all fall to the ground at the same time, into a pile of human emotion and gratitude.
That tornado ended up being one of the top seven most deadly storms in the United States! An F-4 that killed more than 160 people. Luckily for me . . . my loved ones were spared. Or was it luck?
That morning had started out for me like several others. I had to drive to my weekly appointment in the city. However, my course of fate was altered . . . by a good-looking stranger with a captivating smile, in a parking lot. His motives . . . well, to this day those remain unknown. Or maybe not?
An encounter with a stranger in a parking lot . . . who may have been Heaven sent. As it turns out, he may have been a Guardian Angel? That one weird event may have 'Altered My Life' forever! The extra time that I spent earlier in the day, in that city parking lot, may have saved my life! May have saved my child's life!
What if? What if I had arrived home just minutes earlier? No doubt, I would have been carrying my Baby across the apartment parking lot, just as that deadly tornado swept through! As it turned out, the beginning of my ordinary day . . . . ended with my own personal miracle . . . in a parking lot.