Stranded

Ice crystals pelt your face like needles. You turn and scrunch down into your jacket, trying to find a place the wind can't reach. You've been here before, it all seems so similar. Realizing the wind and sleet are unrelenting you take up your course again. Walking head-long into the beating and blistering weather. It's the dead of night and you didn't notice the black ice. Your windshield had become coated in a thick blanket of frozen water rendering your windshield wipers useless. "Only a few more miles to go" you say to yourself as you push the accelerator, straining to see the road. Soon you're in a flat spin, your car careens into a snow bank deep into the left ditch. You can't stay there, and it's only about a mile to the house. This road is rarely traveled, chances of getting picked up in the day are slim, let alone at 11pm. You forgot your cell phone on the kitchen counter.

The wind hasn't backed down in the last quarter mile. The good news is, you can't feel it anymore. Muttering under your breath with each step closer to home you replay the events that lead up to this moment. You'd had that dog for 10years. He was a true member of the family. When you noticed he couldn't stand earlier this evening you picked him up and put him in the back of the car. With weather on the horizon you rushed him into the vet hospital. Unfortunately old age and kidney failure were a deadly combination. By the time you arrived at the hospital, he was gone. Passed away in the back of the car alone. How were you going to tell the family?

It figures, because nothing has been going right. Two weeks ago you were laid off because the contract on your work expired. One week before that, your grandma died. Now this. He was a good dog. You can't help but feel bitter and angry. The weather was really blowing in now. Looking out the window of the hospital the vet-tech is asking how you want to proceed. You look back at her with a glare and say "just burn him" and walk out the door. Heart broken, spirit torn, and emotionally exhausted you get in your car.

You can see the porch light in the distance. It fades in and out with each gust of snow and ice. You can't feel your legs. Each step takes more and more effort. Exhausted, you fall to your knees. With frozen tears you look up to the sky. Wanting to believe in something, you softly whisper for help. It's not so much physical as it is spiritual. You're broken. It's been one thing after another, too much too fast, and much like the vehicle in the ditch your life is out of control. Looking down at the snow and ice covered road you notice your shadow. You never heard the truck pull up behind you, and you didn't recognize the driver. "Need some help?" the stranger asks with a smile. You can only muster a nod. "Get in" he says. Climbing in to the warm cab of the truck a sudden rush of peace falls over you. "called a buddy o' mine"..."well have your car out of the ditch in a bit". You don't say thank you even though you want to. As he drops you off in front of your house,  "Who are you?" you ask. "A friend. We'll drop your car off once we getter pulled out, now go inside and get warmed up." With that,  the truck drives back off into the storm.

The next morning you look out your window to see your car sitting in the drive. There's a paper under the windshield wiper. "Probably the bill" you think out loud. Walking out to your car in pajamas and slippers you slide the note out from under the blade. It reads:

Ask and you shall receive, seek and you will find, knock and the door will be opened for you. For those who ask receive, those who seek find, and those who knock it will be opened.

~A friend~

This time, the tears weren't frozen....

~Caleb