People who touch lives for good are known as "angels in disguise." Most are small miracles. The angel is known to us, like the teacher who
takes his or her own time to show us how to get the right answer, or the person that takes time to show us how to bait a hook, even though our
babble scares away the fish. Sometimes we do not know the angel, but the miracle will never be forgotten.They are so monumental, to us, they
change our lives forever.
Here's to all those unnamed angels in disguise out there that have touched lives and made a difference:
There was the woman (in her mid 80s) who protected a girl (in her mid teens) -- me on the B & O out of Chicago. She looked younger
and I far older, though that was not reality -- we were both younger than our years. She let me sit beside her on a nearly empty train. It
seemed I was with her, and was thereby chaperoned and protected.
I had run through the train from the very back to the front, chased by a
strange man. She kept me safe. I will never forget her, though I never knew her name. She had the most unusual engagement ring (a cage
holding a gold nugget), worn with age. She said, among many other things, "I have four children whom I love with all my heart, but I don't
like one of them." I thought, "How sad." I now have two of my own -- grown and gone -- and understand completely!
Then, there are the two men that pushed my car to the gas station in the rain for blocks and paid for my gas. It happened years ago in North
Highlands, Calif. My son, Blu (Frank IV), was in his first year of junior high school. The flu was making the rounds at the time. It seemed
everyone had it or was just getting over it. It was a bad epidemic.
Blu had just gotten over it and had started back to school after an excused
week out. Frank, my husband, had been sick with it, but was back at work. My youngest (there is eight years between the two) was finally
down and sleeping it off. I had succumbed and took off work, which was rare for me. We could ill afford it. Dawn and I had the flu severely.
We were especially sick.
It was with a fever, cough, pains, and all, that I went back to bed, after dosing Dawn and myself. I had just crawled back into bed when Blu,
breathless, came to the door yelling, the bus drove off without him. I jumped up, glancing at the clock, noticing he had just 15 minutes to
make it to school. It was over an hour ago that I sent him to catch the bus. "Such a story!"
I was angry with him as I grabbed up the car keys and Dawn, blanket and all. I was glad that my husband had left me the car for once.
Otherwise Blu would have had an unexcused absence. It would have meant he would have been dropped from the honor roll, no unexcused
absences allowed.
The low gas buzzer penetrated my fogged brain after we were well on the way to school. The nearest gas station was a few blocks beyond the
school. I never used it because the gas there was much higher in cost. But, the way the buzzer was going off, I knew I had little choice. By
the time we made it to the school, Blu had finally admitted he had stopped in to see his sick friend, and lost track of time.
I got him there at the first bell. That gave him five minutes to get to his first class. If he ran, he would make it. I drove on toward the gas
station. The car did not make it. It coasted to a stop just in sight of the gas station.
I had been bad enough thinking of pumping gas in a worn, flimsily long nightgown, but now my only choice was to walk, barefoot and robe
less as well. I thought I would have to buy a container with some gas. I just hoped I would have enough money. It was then that I opened the
purse. I stared at the empty interior, astonished. It was only then, I vaguely remembered, that the last time I was out, I used my good purse,
not my everyday bag, the one I now had. Everything was at home in the other purse.
So there I was, sitting in a stalled car, early in the morning, on a deserted street, with the temperature rapidly falling, without any shoes, or
robe, dressed in a faded, worn, old nightgown, smelling of Mentholatum. I wiped my running nose on the hem of the gown and looked at my
sleeping daughter in the back seat, feeling lost. I did not even have a handkerchief. Home was far away. It was over a mile back to our house,
and it had just begun to rain. The only good thing was the buzzer was finally silent.
I was just sitting there, trying to decide if I should wait for a break in the rain, when an old VW van pulled up behind me. Currently, this was
the early '80s, and this van was right out of Woodstock. It should have come from the '60s. It was garishly painted. Two men emerged. I did
not see the one on the far side too well, but the one on my side was the epitome of a "biker rebel"' He could have eaten glass and razor blades
for breakfast, he looked that hard. As we lived only miles from Folsom, he could have been there for anything major. My thoughts ran wild.
He had a black hat with skin tight leather pants that left nothing to the imagination. He had a necklace of chicken bones and feathers. If he
shaved anything it was his chest. He was so unsympathetic looking, he did not even have goose bumps in the cold rain. I felt I was finished,
dead and gone.
I might have thought of myself as a naive country girl, but I knew he could have smashed in the car window with one blow of his fist, so I
rolled down the window. After all, it was no real protection. I was in this little old cheap Toyota. Besides, why punish the car for my
stupidity? If I was going to die, I just hoped they would not notice my sleeping child in the back seat.
The man leaned in out of the rain. He rolled the blackened toothpick around his mouth and asked what I was doing there, not using those
words by any stretch of the imagination.
So, I told him everything. I cried, making my runny nose worse.
You can never tell a book by its cover, or a gentleman by his clothes. The two men pushed the car, in the rain, to the gas station and bought
me gas. They would not let me out of the car, not that I wanted to get out. I never got their names or any way to repay them. To me they were
true "angels,"' though they might never have thought of themselves that way.
Also, I must include the angels who backed me up when I took on a strange man who hit a female neighbor. She was not a person anyone liked. It
was my neighborhood and my neighbor that I was standing up for, not as much her, though I know I would have stood up even for her!
As he
was driving off, I realized that man could have easily killed me, unarmed and much smaller than he, and as depraved as he appeared to be.
But those neighbors many of whom I did not know stood outside, armed with rifles, to back me up. I did not know they were there until
the big man left. Who says neighbors don't stick together? I know many do not approve of guns, but I owe my life to "armed angels."
After over 50 years, I have hundreds of stories of "angels in disguise" experiences. No one can live without at least one! Who was there for
you?