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| Photo credits: Virgin Mary Family |
It was summer of 1990 when I heard the good news from my soon to be employer in Nashville, Tennessee. After thorough performance evaluations among the three of us who were sent from the California duplication facility to do start-up/installations in their printing facility, David James, General Manager of then Sullivan Software Services, later renamed to Nicholstone Software Services, informed me that he was hiring me. He told me that their company is giving me $3,000.00 for moving expenses, and it’s up to me how I am going to relocate.
Later that day, I talked to Lyn, a friend of mine who worked as a duplication operator in our company, and asked him if he could help me out in relocating my family to Nashville. Lyn was a country music lover, loved parties and an outdoor lover. Upon hearing my proposition that I was going to take him out to every country bars in town that we made a stop-over, he gladly accepted my request. The fact that he hasn’t been to Nashville, America’s Music City, made my offer to him more enticing. The next day, he went to Human Resources and filed for a one-week vacation.
After work, I went to Radioshack and bought two identical Realistic CB radios and installed one of them in my newly purchased, brand new, light gray Nissan pick-up truck. I installed the other CB radio in my white Nissan mini-van. Back in the days, cell phones were not yet popular because they were bulky and expensive. I figured it would be helpful to have CB radios instead in each car, so we can communicate with each other while driving.
The next day when I woke up I was surprised and upset at the same time, because somebody smashed the driver side window of my pick-up truck and stole my newly-installed CB radio. Luckily enough, both items were covered in my insurance policy and had them re-installed and fixed on the same day. Unfortunately, that cost me one day delay in my trip.
It was clear, and bright sunny mid-day when we left our residence in Santa Clara, California. Before we left, I double-checked the mounting harness connecting my kids’ bikes to the roof-rack of my mini-van, and also made sure all the luggages were tightly packed, and in-place in both cars.
As Lyn and I just had coffee for breakfast, we decided to have lunch in Gilroy -Garlic Capital of the World, which is about an hour drive from Santa Clara. After lunch, we continued on our trip until we reached Needles. We decided to stay there for the night, and checked-in at Rodeway Inn and Suites Hotel which is directly off Interstate 40, and with a number of restaurants nearby.
After dinner with Lyn and my family, I took him to a Country Bar and Pub House as I promised to him. We had some beers while enjoying live music from the featured folk singer, before settling in for the night.
We did not cover much on the first day of our trip, as we still woke up in California, and not anywhere in Arizona, which I plotted on my map, one week before the trip. At break of dawn I woke up everybody, and told them to get ready, “We are leaving early today to get a good head start.”
The sun was just starting to peek from the cumulus clouds and its golden rays showed promise of a clear and sunny day ahead of our long trip, when we headed out of the hotel exit.
“Breaker, breaker…this is Mad Dog, come in Maharlika, do you copy, over,” Lyn barked on my CB radio. “Loud and clear, 10-4” was my reply. He said he was just testing how far can we get a clear transmission, as he estimated he was already five miles ahead of me based on the mile markers along the road. Later, I heard him singing with my kids joining him. He had Vilmor and Vladimir in the front passenger seat of my pick-up truck. After a while, I heard him cursing. “What’s up buddy?” I asked. “I’m being sandwiched by these mother-fucking truckers,” he shouted back at me. Sure enough when I was able to catch up with him, I saw one rig in front of him, one behind him, and two on his sides. I guessed these truckers got irritated with his singing on the CB plus the fact that we were on the same bandwidth as them; we were intruding on their communication lines. For a while, I was tensed and didn’t really know what to do. The mere sight of my small truck with my kids in it, in-between those big ten-wheelers terrified me. I can’t do anything, except pray that nothing bad happened to them. After a lengthy two-mile run, the truckers dispersed from their formation as if nothing happened, and let my friend go. “Thank you Lord,” was all I could say, as I was still terrified. This was an answered prayer, if I may say.
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| My friend, Lyn with my two kids: Vladimir and Vilmor |
We decided to have lunch in McDonald’s somewhere in Flagstaff, Arizona, since we were driving four hours non-stop already. “This is good, I said to break down the silence of everyone. We had breakfast in California, we’re having lunch in Arizona, and pretty soon we’re going to have dinner in New Mexico.” My kids shouted in unison, “Yehey!”
We’re back on Interstate 40 after lunch. This time, I decided to lead the way, and had my friend, Lyn following me closely. After about a couple of hours of non-stop driving, I noticed some stratus clouds were beginning to form in the horizon. That’s strange, because it’s summer time and the weather was just fairly clear and bright, although a bit humid. As I passed the blind curve along a mountainous area, I encountered some drizzling rain. Eventually, it began to pour heavily followed by the darkening clouds brought by strong winds. All of a sudden, lightning flashed in-front of my mini-van followed by roaring thunder, as if the mythical gods were playing bowling right above us. I called Lyn on my CB radio and told him to follow closely, so we don’t lose each other. Before he can answer back, twin lightnings struck on the left and right side of the road followed with a much louder and prolonged thunder. “Hey, Vic it looks like we’re having an early 4th of July,” Lyn said, as lightning began criss-crossing our path. Then I heard Vilmor, “Daddy, daddy I’m scared.” Vilmor, who was just seven-and-a-half years old at that time was terrified because that was the first time he encountered something like that. Amazingly, Vladimir who is two years younger than him was awfully quiet according to Lyn.
“Vilmor, calm down. Just pray to Jesus, ok…tell Vladimir to also pray, and give the “mic” back to Lyn.” I told Lyn, “We can’t continue driving like this. I can’t hardly see the road because of heavy rains and gusty winds. I’m going to make an exit at the first sign of a motel or any lodging facility along the road.” “Copy that Maharlika,” replied Lyn. We drove for another five miles at a crawling speed like a turtle under continuous bombardments of lightning and thunder, until I finally saw an unlighted motel sign made visible by the flash of lightning. Power lines were already cut-off along the stretch of that locality. As we drove, we were continuously praying to the Holy Spirit to guide us and keep us safe from harm. That lightning flash, as I was about to pass the motel sign, was to me another answered prayer. Had it not flashed at the right moment, I would have passed that exit to the motel.
As we were entering the entrance to the motel, all of a sudden I saw the corrugated GI metal sheet of the motel roof came off and started flying towards our direction. I accelerated faster and tried to move sideways in order to avoid being hit, but it seemed too late for that maneuver. Besides, Lyn was following me closely, and I didn’t think that he saw the oncoming danger. I closed my eyes and started chanting, “Come Holy Spirit, I need you…come Holy Spirit, I pray.” Then I started praying, “Our Father Thou art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy Name, Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven…” Before I could finish with the Lord’s Prayer, I heard a loud swishing sound. When I opened my eyes, I saw a gust of twirling wind carrying the metal roofing away from our path. Thank you Lord, was all I could mutter.
That was the third time in a day that the power of prayers was manifested by God. Some non-believers might say that it was just mere coincidental. For me, it was my Faith and firm belief in the power of Prayers that saved us that day, and it will remain that way to this day.
Despite the fact that I lost my faith in the institution that taught me how to pray, I still believe in the power of prayers. Do you?
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