Looming Down the Gates of Heaven
What a near-miss accident taught me about inner peace.
Bob Olson is the host of Afterlife TV, author of Answers About The Afterlife and The Magic Mala, and founder of BestPsychicDirectory.com. You’re reading his articles on Bob Olson Connect.
In one way, it seemed like nothing worth spending a moment thinking about. In another way, it felt like something huge, so enormous that I didn’t have words to describe it. This is me trying to reconcile the two.
It was Sunday afternoon. We had a relaxing day by the pool with our dogs—pretty much a perfect day. We decided to go to a nearby store in search of a gift that had been eluding us. Melissa wanted to take the Spyder, our three-wheeled motorcycle. I hesitated because I’d just taken a shower and knew I’d have “helmet head” for the rest of the day. Realizing this was a silly reason not to take the Spyder, I agreed.
We hopped on the motorcycle—me driving and Melissa behind me—and went down the street. No more than twenty-five feet down the road, we passed our neighbor, also named Bob. I didn’t notice him until he was beside us, upon which I waved my hand so that he might see it in his rearview mirror. As Bob’s pickup truck drove by, the vehicle behind him was a gigantic, navy blue GMC pickup driving on our side of the road straight towards us. I assumed he was avoiding a pothole on his side of the road, as there was no other reason for him to be in our lane (unless he was texting).
There was no time to react. One second, the wind of our 35-mile-per-hour movement was cooling the 95-degree air, and the next, I stared into a massive grille with the letters GMC as if it were the gates of heaven. In moments like this, time slows down. In this case, it might have stood completely still. I was thinking, we’re going to die. There was nowhere for me to steer away from this truck. There wasn’t time, plus I was already driving on the right side of my lane, and there were trees if I went any further to the right.