When Angels Come

When Angels Come

In those hours and days of misery when hope cannot find its way to my pain, there comes an inscrutable stirring within that calms and brings me a modest peace.

There was a time when I was driving from Decatur, Illinois to Springfield, Illinois. On a long stretch of two-lane highway, behind a big semi-hauler and my patience thin, I thought I had room to pass on the rising straightaway. I pulled out to pass and slammed the accelerator. Suddenly, abreast of the semi, I saw a fast-moving car coming toward me. I decided to brake and get back behind the semi, but my speed was such that, once behind the semi I was about to ram into its rear end. Instinctively, I steered my car to the right gravel shoulder, hit a patch of sloping grass and slid sideways, passing the semi with its driver and…