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Random Thoughts on the Drive In
Note: I wrote this some time ago and found it collecting dust in my drafts. I decided to set it free and burden you with it.
The last thing on earth I can concentrate on is driving, as any number of people that have ridden shotgun with me will go into unverifiable hyperbole to illustrate.
I am either playing a selection of music in my Spotify™ “Liked Songs”, a collection that weaves and wobbles like a drunken sailor walking the plank, playing an audiobook on Audible™, or doing a little self-dictation—most of which I forget and lose forever to the atmosphere and whatever angels and demons are paying attention.
On this morning’s drive, I found myself wandering through my bank of distant memories and occasionally stepping face-first into a thought of my own. They were as unrelated as my song list, which jumped aimlessly from Take Me Home Country Roads to Chelsea Hotel #2 to Rough Boy to Amazing Grace.
The Other Guy
Since I was on my way to work, where, thankfully, I do not clock in, but am expected nevertheless to be, I thought about my dad, a serial entrepreneur whose product lines and services included used automobiles, auto electrical repair and rebuilding, and health and life insurance, not to mention Jesus. He was a bi-vocational preacher.
Dad sometimes used the term, “Working for the other guy.”
He always asserted there was not much to be gained “working for the other guy,” and he had no interest in it. He only broke his hard, fast rule of working for himself when circumstances dictated it beyond all reasonable defiance. He would rather go broke his way than stay broke, enriching someone else.
I once pointed out that even at D&F Battery & Electric, which he owned and operated, and where I entered the workforce at the age of eleven, he was working for “the other guy,” because he only had work if someone else needed it done.
“But I do it on my terms, and it is my business, and that’s the difference,” he allowed.
Well, I’m sorry, Dad.
I have spent an inordinate portion of my life working for the other guy, But I will tell you this—and no one can honestly say different—I write what I want! When I write, I am the other guy, and sometimes dozens of other guys, and girls, too. I write what I damn well please.
Death Defied!
Something in my music, or maybe it was the current audiobook, which is Mark Twain by Ron Chernow, the familiar term “Death-defying act” came to mind.
My mind immediately went back to July 3, 2023. We were at my daughter’s and son-in-law’s place for barbecue and a pool party. Everyone thought it would be cute if DooDah and Mimi (Donya and me) jumped off the waterfall rocks together. We were game. That was not necessarily a death-defying act. I have jumped off higher things (a Palo Pinto County bridge) into more uncertain water (The Brazos River). This was barely six feet high and the water was blue and see-through.
Turns out, not only was that a death-defying act, but almost everything I had done for the past God-knows-how-long was. I had an episode with my heart right after diving in and swimming to the other end of the pool. I needed to lie down a bit to recover.
“I’m fine,” I assured everyone.
I wasn’t.
The next day was Independence Day. I came this close to celebrating a new kind of freedom, which is to say, freedom from this body of clay.
I had a full-fledged heart attack.
Upon fitting my Lower Anterior Descending Artery (the infamous LAD, or Widow-Maker) with two stents, the surgeon told me I “was very lucky to be alive.”
“I don’t know how you walked in here,” he said. “Your artery was 99.9% blocked. It’s called the Widow-Maker for a reason.”
Life Itself
Here is something to latch onto, if you forget everything else in this article: Life itself was a death-defying act.
Life itself is a death-defying act.
But isn’t it always? Death hounds us from birth, and eventually catches each of us—some sooner, others later.
If you are going to go to the trouble to defy death, at least, while you are at it, dare to live.
For God and Glory
My thoughts soon took me in another direction. One of the things I hated most as a young minister was cold-calling on people to solicit them to attend church or invite them to own Jesus. I was all for them doing both; I was just not built to be a door-to-door salesman, even for God and glory.
I thought about how a random, apparently inconsequential moment can change the direction, the tenor, and the tone of your life. A wonderful, beautiful woman who attended the church where I served as an Associate Pastor and youth leader asked me to visit her son and his wife, and invite them to church.
“I just know they will love you, and they need to get on the right path.”
As mentioned, I did not want to do this. It was not my comfort zone. But I was going to do it anyway. It was my duty to her and God, as I saw it.
I was nineteen and married, with one child. Her son and his wife were also nineteen, married, and had one child. I hadn’t yet met them, but I had an inkling. They were living life to its fullest, as wild as the wind. I didn’t think they would be keen on exchanging their lifestyle for church.
I was wrong—so gloriously and completely wrong!
Keith and Debbie accepted my invitation to attend a church service. Within weeks, they became our fast friends. In our living room, I led Debbie through the sinner’s prayer and she accepted Christ as her Savior. They went to work with us in the youth department. Months later, we rented a single Ryder truck (one was enough, for we each had meager possessions) and moved to Springfield, Missouri to attend seminary. Keith became a preacher. Later, he and Debbie moved to California to accept the position of Associate Pastor at the church where I served as Senior Pastor.
We were all nineteen, green, and gung-ho when we met. Since our birthdays are only separated by four months of the same year, we are each 64 as of this writing, and still best friends.
Mine has been a life worth living, though I have never been worthy of it. I have done things, been things, said things, and written things. I have met regret head on and tried my best to deflect whatever accolades have come my way to the One truly deserving of all the praise.
I have fought with fire-breathing dragons and demons, met some hither and others yon, and slayed them one by one.
Widow-Maker? Pff. I am the Widow-Maker.
Oh, look. Time to go to work.
