Friday, December 21, 2007

Two Turtle Doves

On the second day of Christmas, we drove. I dropped Jaime off at work around 8. I went home and finished packing the food and as much of the cooler as I could. Got the last of the food for the trip from the store and made the sandwiches. Dan arrived around 1130 and we packed the car up and went to get Jaime.

Dan took the first leg of the trip and got us all the way out of Arizona. It was a beautiful drive up the mountains and then back down into New Mexico. We stopped for gas and a bathroom break and then Jaime took over the driving. The sun had set by this point and the weather started to turn a little. Still at a pretty high altitude, we ran into a little bit of snow blowing across the highway. It must have rained here earlier because the highways were covered with ice. We saw one person go into the ditch in front of us and two others that had already found their place in the mud.

Now in Texas and the dead of night all around us we gas up again, potty and switch. It was my turn to drive and being 11 hours in my eyes began to play tricks on me. Jaime was my co pilot and she was having trouble staying awake as well. Off in the distance I was all but certaithat I saw our impending doom. A couple minutes later Jaime said: "Dave, do you see that..?" and I finished her sentance with "funnel cloud?" "Yeah." "Yeah I see it." As we approached it became more and more apparent that there was in fact a giant tornado in front of us. The strange thing was, it didnt seem to be affecting the rest of the weather around us. It just loomed in the distance, barely moving, as if to say, Im waiting for you, and I am patient. Jaime turned the radio to FM (rather then the XM we had been listening to) to see if we could find a weather channel. No luck. We got closer and closer. Then, in the distance, we saw the cause of our fears, the worlds biggest cross. It was lit from below and its shadow against the dark cloudy Texas sky looked like a twister. I have never been so thankful for Christs sacrifice.

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