God Drives a Tow Truck

  God Drives a Tow Truck Vicky Kaseorg

  God Drives a Tow Truck- An Anthology of True Encounters

  The story of how God uses a nobody

  As though she were a somebody

  Written and illustrated by

  Vicky Kaseorg

  Other books by Vicky Kaseorg

  I’m Listening with a Broken Ear - 2011

  God Drives a Tow Truck

  Illustrated by

  Vicky Kaseorg

  ISBN-13:

  978-1468014792

  ISBN-10:

  146801479X

  Disclaimers and Dedications

  This book is a collection of true stories, colored only by the natural distortion of time and memory. I have endeavored to present the facts as accurately as I can, despite the fact that my family accuses me of fabrication. I tell you, I did see a bear on roller skates when I was five years old. I admit, it is possible that he was not as skilled a roller skater as I remember, as it is not likely that he could have outrun the farmer chasing him with a pitchfork, at least not when roller-skating across such a bumpy surface as the field.

  Nonetheless, my family no longer trusts everything that emerges from my pen, but I assure you, God is amazing and truth is indeed stranger than fiction. Really, I am not clever enough to have made up these stories.

  The only fabrication in these stories is, on occasion, I have changed the names of some characters, to protect the people who populated my past that might prefer to remain incognito.

  I gratefully thank my dear family and friends that have allowed me to share the presence of angels and miracles on earth recounted in this book.

  Chapter One

  God Drives a Tow Truck

  Hebrews 1:14

  14 Are not all angels ministering spirits sent to serve those who will inherit salvation?

  The day I was slated to die, I had not seen my husband for six weeks. I was working towards advanced certification in my field, Occupational Therapy, far from home. I had traded the twelve foot snow drifts of New York for six weeks of classes in balmy Augusta, Georgia. When the classes ended, winter was almost over, as well. I set off for the fifteen hour drive back to NY. Most sane people would have split that drive into two days, but I was anxious to get home, and at that stage in our life, a hotel would have been a luxury.

  When I left Augusta, it was warm and sunny, with early flowers already blooming on the azalea bushes. By the time I hit the Pennsylvania mountains, not only was I propping my red eyes open with toothpicks, but the temperature had plummeted fifty degrees. Snow and sleet were beginning to pelt the windshield. I shivered as I wearily slogged through the endless miles. The roads grew slicker as the sleet fell steadily, and darkness descended.

  This combination was not the perfect recipe for safe driving. I was not a good snow driver under the best of circumstances. I repeatedly studied the charts detailing how to turn the wheel into a skid, but prayed I never had to challenge my retention skills. To be truthful, at that time I would not have exactly prayed. I would have crossed my fingers and rubbed a rabbit foot. I did not know God, though I was wondering about Him. I was reading the Bible, mostly to prove that it was a bunch of nonsense. However, I sometimes offered God a challenge. If you really are there God, then show me. To this point, He had not hopped out from behind any burning bushes, nor had He bothered to whisper in my ear. He certainly had enough fans, and didn’t need my ticket sale.

  As the night grew darker, the sleet became a wall of ice shards and I was having trouble seeing. I had slowed down considerably, so now was entering my fifteenth hour of driving, with two hours still remaining before I reached Binghamton. There was almost no one else out on those treacherous roads now. It was late, the road conditions worsened, and I was exhausted.

  It was inevitable that would be the night I faced death. When the car began to skid on the black ice, it was really the only thing that could have occurred. It had only been a matter of when. I tried to turn my wheels into the skid, or was I supposed to turn away from the skid? I quickly realized that no matter which way I turned the steering wheel, there was no traction and the car was free from the effects of friction, which I had until that point in my life, cherished far too little.

  The car skidded blithely into the oncoming lane, not seeming to care one whit that the driver was begging it to consider other options. I spun the wheel into the curve, and then away from the curve, but still the car was gliding, sliding straight towards the guardrails propped like spaghetti alongside yawning, black chasms.

  I am going to die, I thought sadly, and my poor husband is waiting in vain for me to come home. I will never have children, and I will never become a famous artist. My parents will be disconsolate, and I will never find out if my hair will one day be silver like my mom’s, or just dingy grey like a jackal. I will never find the perfect haircut, or a shoe that is both beautiful and comfortable. I had just begun to live and there was so much I wanted to do. I felt not so much fear, as grief for all I would never have a chance to experience. The wall of white snowbank filled my world as the car slammed against the guard rail, skidded back to the other lane, and flipped. Then, there was nothingness.

  I opened my eyes, hearing a faint knocking. Maybe I had it backwards, but I was under the impression that I would be the one knocking at a pearly gate under such circumstances. I was surprised to find Heaven was exactly as big as an old VW bug. I straightened my back, and felt the seatbelt against my lap. This wasn’t Heaven, or thankfully, any place warmer. I knew that because surely, no one needs seatbelts in Heaven, and there would be no snow drifts in Hell. I concluded I must be alive, and I was still in my car. I heard the knock again, and then noticed a man in a grey uniform peering in the car window.

  “Are you ok, ma’am?” he asked.

  “I don’t know….am I?” I sat up.

  “You have four wheel wells bashed in, but I can straighten those for you.”

  I looked in my rear view mirror. There was an enormous shiny tow truck behind me with myriad rows of flashing lights all blinking like Christmas. Where had that come from? I had been completely alone on the deserted highway. What a miracle that he had chanced along just at my moment of need.

  He went right to work, moving around the four corners of my car. It didn’t occur to me that he had no tools, nor any helper, and was apparently smoothing and aligning crushed metal bare handedly. He returned to my window and said, “You should be fine now. Do you have far to go?”

  “No,” I answered, “Only about another hour.”

  “Well go slowly, and you will make it. I will wait for you to pull out to be sure your car is ok.”

  I thanked him, and realized, as he returned to his tow truck, that he had not asked me for money. I thought that was what tow trucks did on such miserable nights. Why hadn’t he asked me to pay him?

  I put on my turn signal, glanced behind me, and pulled onto the road. The car drove easily. I glanced back again and paused. Something was odd. I looked over my shoulder, and then in my mirror. Where was the tow truck? Where was the immense shiny truck with yellow lights flashing in the icy darkness? It seemed to have vanished. I looked in front of me. No, it was not there either. There was not a soul on the road. Only me, for as far as I could see ahead or behind. I stuck my head out the window and looked up. Nothing but snow swirled before my eyes.

  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 ot
her.

  “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.