Everything Happens For A Reason

This post wasn't going to be about this. The photos and content don't exactly flow, but- then again, they do.

Yesterday, just after putting the babies down for their quiet time, my phone rang.
It was Christopher. Christopher never calls me during the day. So rarely, that we have an ongoing joke that if he calls instead of texting- we must have gotten orders.

So today when the phone rang, in the back of my mind, we had gotten orders. And then when he said "I don't really know how to tell you this, but-" ... again, I thought we had gotten orders.

And then, instead of hearing the words that my mind had hyped itself up to hear- he paused, took a deep breath, and said.. "I just got into a car accident".



I thought he had taken his scooter. All I could see flashing through the projector screen on the back of my eyelids, was somebody hitting his scooter and throwing him across an intersection. I imagined him talking to me from a hospital bed, the only part of his body working being his heart and his voice, and I broke down.

I broke down so hard that I stopped breathing. I choked, and choked, and choked. There was air in the room, but I couldn't find it. I held my chest, my knees hit the mat that I was previously standing on, and I panicked.

Christopher was on the phone with me, talking to me, but still- my heart had been attacked by terror, and I assumed the worst. I just couldn't get the image of him being thrown from his scooter out of my mind.

Only. For some reason, on this day... he hadn't taken his scooter.
He took the van.

It wasn't until he said the words "the van is totaled", that the all too traumatizing image in my head started to clear, and the connection of his voice talking to me combined with the words "I'm okay" started to make sense.

He hadn't taken the scooter.
He had taken the van.



My hyperventilating slowed. A switch in my brain flipped from worry to anger, back to worry, back to anger, back to worry. He gave me a few details, and then hung up the phone. In the couple of minutes that we spoke though, I hadn't heard anything other than "I was in a car accident", and after his voice was gone, I went back into a panic.

The air in the room, gone again.

Where was he? Who was with him? How was he hurt? Was he okay?
Come home. Come home to me right now.
Call me back! Please, call me back.
Are you okay?
Thank God you didn't take the scooter. Thank God you're not broken.
Please don't ever scare me like this again.
Are you okay?



I called my Mom. I didn't know what else to do. And I went through every emotion in the book. By the time I got off the phone with her half an hour later, I was calm enough to breathe. She stabilized me. I opened the blinds, and I stared out the window, waiting for him to drive up.

After a few minutes passed, and he didn't come home- the panic came back.
Seriously, heart? Give me a break.
Lungs, breathe.

My best friend called. When we finished crying hysterically, and finished talking about what didn't happen/ what could have happened- she kept me company long distance, and distracted my worst fears from overwhelming me, until he got home.


I ran outside with the baby in my arms, and looked for him frantically. I hugged him, and then pushed his embrace away, and started touching the right side of his body, asking if my touch hurt. He said he was ok, but I didn't believe him. I still don't believe him. I keep looking for marks. How is he so lucky?

Our van is trashed. His armor, towed away, headed for the junk yard.

My husband is alive.
My babies are alive.
My family is alive.
Thank God, he took the van.

It could have been so much worse.

And at least now we know I play it cool when under pressure right?
...ok not so much.

Looks like for the time being its just the five of us, and a motor scooter. How many cartons of soy milk do you think you can strap to the back of a Ruckus?
We'll soon find out!