Two Seconds, Crash

If I’d have been two seconds earlier, I might be dead today. Along with the other two people that were with me.

There is an inspirational parable called “Don’t Kick the Donkey,” in which a traveler drives his foot into his donkey over and over again while the animal just stands in the road, not moving. The donkey appears impervious to the blows, until all of a sudden he begins to walk. To make a long story short, the donkey was immobile because an angel told him to stop walking. Up ahead lay in wait a band of robbers, waiting to attack the next passer-by.

Three years ago, I was leaving the Lake Charles Civic Center with two friends, and I accidentally drove straight instead of veering left to the correct exit. One friend asked me where I was going, poking fun at the latest edition of Jeff’s notoriously quirky driving mistakes. I quickly amended the mistake throwing it in reverse, then back in drive again within a couple seconds.

My friend continued to remark at my driving prowess. His wife defended me, but the joke prattled on. We were, after all, knocked off of our course a whole two seconds. I realized it was all in fun, but I have to admit the jokes can get old, even grating on the nerves, especially because the little error wasn’t a big deal in the first place. I drove forward at about 15 mph, approaching a two-way stop sign. I had the right-of-way, and we watched with shock as a car sped through the stop sign at about 50 mph. In a quiet, tree-thick neighborhood, you never approach that speed. We had a front row seat to what crash could have happened had I crossed that intersection just two seconds sooner.

It wasn’t long after I rolled through that intersection (very gingerly, I might add) that my mind recalled the little driving mistake back at the Civic Center. My friend had stopped ribbing me about it, now talking about how crazy the driver was and how you have to be so careful these days. I don’t even think he put two and two together. Everything he’d been teasing me about had to happen, or else we would have been smack-dab in the middle of that intersection when that crazy man sped through.

I said a short prayer and probably glanced up at my truck ceiling, picturing heaven above. I hadn’t yet heard the parable “Don’t Kick the Donkey,” but a year later I would, giving me an opportunity to tell the person who told it to me my own version of the tale.

Sometimes we find ourselves stuck in these little pauses in life, where it almost seems like there’s a glitch in the system and the person in charge is playing tricks on us. We love the phrase, “That’s just my luck…,” and use it to explain some new obstacle in our lives that causes catastrophic delays in our precious schedules. It can make us bitter and cynical, so short-sighted that we become unable to see the beautiful patterns of our lives.

This can be especially frustrating when a writer has writer’s block. It is inevitable that all writers face the inability to create, but the difference between average writing and the great writing that follows a pause may lie in the virtue of patience. There may be something that has to pass, some experience we have to go through, even if it’s as simple as driving six feet too far onto the wrong road, before we are ready to move on in our story. And yes, our friends will try to push us forward, to say that success comes only to the strong. And that is often times true. Sometimes, though, it’s not. Whatever the experience is may not be a sign of incompetence or weakness or even writer’s block; instead, it may be our angel-inspired donkey waiting in the middle of the road for trouble to pass. True strength comes from not forcing the issue, but in sitting back with our legs propped up and a margarita in hand, waiting for the right time. This week’s challenge is to try not to kick the keyboard, ehr, donkey, and to wait patiently while the intersection clears and to know with confidence that with the passing of just a little time, our words can come with so much more abundance and power.

Jeff LeJeune is the author of The Final Chase and Postmarked Baltimore. After a deadly disease during college redirected the course of his life, Jeff became a teacher at St. Louis Catholic High School in Lake Charles, LA where he was recently named a Claes Nobel Educator of Distinction.