How will I die?

In the 9 years since the car accident which nearly claimed my life I have often pondered this question. How will I die? Why didn't I die then? What was the purpose in allowing me to live?

I don't know how I will die. Nobody does. Since my accident that horrific October morning I can't help but fear that it will be in a car accident. They are so prevalent. In 2004 an average of 16,924 car accidents were reported each day in the United States. With just over 3 million people in the United States, that gives each person a 1 in 50 chance of getting into a car accident each year. Look around you, at your family, friends, co-workers. People you know online, or even just by name. I know that personally, just on Facebook, I have well over 100 people I know.  So, at least 2 of them, or maybe one will be me again, will get into a car accident every year.  Of course, that number goes up dramatically when I think about all of the people that I know and car about that aren't on Facebook. My immediate family, In-Laws, nieces and nephews, cousins, grandparents etc number well over 200.

So can you understand my fear? I love driving. I love the power of being in control of this massive machine with it's roaring engine. Peeling out when I'm frustrated, going speeds that Henry Ford could have only dreamed about.  Alas, I do not drive much if I can avoid it. My mini van doesn't have the same satisfaction that my Celica did, may it rust in pieces.

I didn't let the car accident prevent me from getting back behind the wheel of a car, I would even drive stick-shift with a neck brace, cast and sling.  It wasn't until I began feeling like a target on the road that I started questioning whether or not I ever wanted to drive again.

On my way to college, shortly after getting married to my magnificent husband, I was nearly run off the road going 60 mph on the freeway. I arrived at my Airbrushing class completely unable to do anything but shake. I couldn't hold my airbrush steady for anything.

Then again, when I was six months pregnant with our first child, I sat at a stop light, 3 cars back from the front of the line.  I glanced into my rear-view mirror and saw a construction sized dump truck heading straight for me at 45 mph.  I had no where to go and no time to react. Fortunately, the driver of the dump truck realized his miscalculation and managed to swerve into the turn lane next to me, narrowly missing my bumper. He was able to get his rig to stop halfway into the intersection. I cried and cried for the rest of my twenty minute drive to the office. The only thing I could think of was my precious unborn child.

That is when I had my realization. That is the reason I was spared death at age 16.  I needed to be a mother. There were children waiting for me to bring them into this world. But why not just let me die and have them born to someone else? Someone more qualified? So many people have such a hard time conceiving, why not give them the blessing of bearing the children that God had prepared for me?

Let me derail for a moment and expound upon something my husband refers to as his "The Lawn will be Mowed" theory.  God has a plan for us, he asked us to come to Earth and to "mow his lawn". If we procrastinate, deliberate or fail in any other way to do this, it will still get done. It is his law. Nothing is left undone. However, we can make it harder on ourselves by disobeying.

Think of when you tell your child to do their chores. Often times the chore is not difficult and will occupy their time for a half hour to an hour, if they are younger, usually just a few minutes.  But our children do not like to do chores, the procrastinate, whine, complain that it's too hard or will take too long. There are more fun and exciting things to do in life than put away laundry.

We know that if they would simply have done their chore without murmuring it would be done and out of the way and they could continue on with the rest of their day as if nothing had been in the way. But since they insist on making it difficult, it will be.

So around we come, the lawn will be mowed. The children God intended for me and my spouse will be for me and my spouse. If I do something in life that seems to take away from that, the fact is, I will have children. I actually have 3 children with one more in the oven. These angels would not have been sent to anyone else, they would not be who they are with anyone else. They are given their best opportunity to be who they will be, with us.  If anyone else where to raise them, they would be different, and God wouldn't have that, and neither would I.

My angels are meant to be with me, at this point in my life and in theirs, that is a certainty I cannot deny. I will let the future bring what it will, but I will fight for my children, because they saved me. They saved me from physical death as a teenager and they saved me from spiritual condemnation as a maturing adult.

                                I love you my angels, you have given me wings.