Signs

Yesterday was a strange day. It was strange from the get go. I was tired when I got up from the time change. When I got to work we didn't have any patients until 2:00 because we have been so slow. The day dragged by and it seemed like 5:00 was never going to come.

Finally it did come, and I set off for home. It is about a 25 minute commute to my work from my home. Part of my commute is on a toll road, which winds through some lovely hills. I usually enjoy the ride to and from work immensely.

Not last night. Despite the sunlight from Daylight savings I was tired and grouchy and just wanted to get home.

On my route home, after I exit the toll road, I end up on a long stretch of highway that is populated with mostly just orange groves. I usually continue on this road for 3 or 4 miles, before turning onto the street that leads to the suburban area where I live.

I take this route every single day. I do not deviate from it. It is the quickest way home because the speed limit is 65 and there is only 1 stoplight before I reach the street that I turn down to get to my apartment complex.

I had just gotten off of the toll road and was driving along talking to myself. (Sometimes I talk to myself in the car, o.k.)? It isn't as strange as it sounds.

O.K., maybe it is. Whatever. So I'm driving down the road that I always take, talking to myself when I come upon the one stoplight on this street. Usually I drive right by it, down further to the light that I turn left on to get to my street.

So I'm coming up on this stoplight and I am talking out loud and all of of sudden I say "I don't want to go that way". (The way I always go).

As soon as I said it I thought how strange it was that I would think something like that, let alone say it out loud.

Next thing I know I am pulling into the left hand turn lane onto a street that I never take to get home.

And I am annoyed at myself. "Now why did I go and do that"? I thought. "This better not make my drive home any longer". I was grouchy at this point.

I continue on this street for a short time and then make a right so I can get to the street I need to be on to get home(the one I had avoided by taking this impromptu "detour").

As I approach this street I notice it seems much more congested than usual. In fact, I have to sit at the light 3 times before we start moving again and I can hear sirens as I approach the intersection where I would have turned to go home.

I say "would have" because I was unable to make the left hand turn. It was closed due to a six car accident that looked as though it had occurred about 6 or 7 minutes earlier. Some people were just getting out of their cars, while others were milling about or sitting at the curb. The police were were just beginning to pull up in their squad cars, blocking the intersection off. The cars were badly damaged and there looked to be some injuries.

I finally was able to get by it, and after the annoyance of being delayed had passed, I suddenly realized that if I hadn't turned left at the light when I did(early), I very well could have been in the path of that accident, at the exact time it took place.

Yes, the odds are that I would have either driven by before it happened or right after, missing it.

But what made me say the words out loud "I don't want to go that way", and what made me make that premature left hand turn, even though I always drove the same way to and from work every day that I have worked at this job(19 months)?

It makes you wonder, doesn't it?

I have always been a big believer in signs, although I'll be the first person to tell you that I have never experienced one before. Well, I may have experienced one, but I was too dense to realize what it was.

Until yesterday. I believe someone was trying to tell me something and I'm glad that I listened.

Or, the whole thing could mean nothing and just be a huge coincidence.

You choose.

But I'm sticking with signs.

And thanking God for making me listen to them.


P.S. I'm so excited because I got tickets to see a taping of the Ellen Degeneres show in April. I watch her show all the time(I DVR it) and she is so funny. I'm stoked!