I need to give you a little history of me and motorcycles! Prior to 1984, I was pretty much a motorcycle nut! My first bike was a used Honda 350. It was a street bike, but I did my best to turn it into an off road machine. I climbed huge hills and did some enduro racing. I could say, “Needless to say”, but, hey, it seems necessary to say, “This became a really battered machine because it just wasn’t built to do what I was doing with it.

My next bike was a Kawasaki 350 Green Horn. It was most definitely an off road, hill climbing, racing kinda machine. I nicknamed her “Mean Green”. Mean Green was also street legal, so it pretty much met my needs for several years. I even built an extra rear seat on it so I could haul both our boys to football practice in one trip.

On December 5, 1975, I was riding one of my friend’s cycles. I went to the hospital to see a gal from our church who’d had surgery for breast cancer. I was headed home just after dusk when it happened! I was approaching an intersection when a little red VW pulled out of a beer joint parking lot. They didn’t have their lights on, the driver was uninsured, driving without a license, and no registration. They pulled across my lane and stopped.

I could see there was no way to avoid hitting them. Fortunately, just a couple of weeks earlier I’d read an article in RIDER magazine. The writer suggested that if one was going to hit something broadside, they should stand on their foot pegs. I did that and it saved my life. The bike stuck in the side of the car, but I literally flew over the top. Broke my arm and leg, but could easily have been killed.

BTW, as I was lying on the side of the road, two things happened that now seem funny/strange, but at the time didn’t. First, all I heard coming from the VW was the sound of pop tops coming off of more beer cans and the driver saying, “Oh, my God, I think we killed him” followed by giggles. Second, a lady came up and told me she was a doctor and offered to help me. I asked her what kind of doctor she was. When she told me she was a veterinarian, I, with my strangely bent sense of humor, asked everyone to not let her touch me. I KNOW what she’d do to a horse in a similar condition!

Well, I recovered and eventually began riding a Yamaha 650. Very rough riding bike, but took me where I wanted to go. Then we moved to Sarasota. I eventually acquired a Yamaha 1100. This was quite a bike. This bike took my wife and me across the country, usually accompanied by our three kids, also on big bikes. That was our primary means of transportation for many years. We camped, cooked out, and had a ball.

After I pretty much wore out the 1100, I got a brand new Kawasaki Voyager. This machine had six cylinders, a built in computer screen on the gas tank that gave me information I really didn’t need, but found quite fascinating. Miles per gallon, miles left in the tank, even an occasional rerun of Happy Days! (Just kidding about the rerun!)

February 24, 1984, I was coming back from a nearby town, headed for the Teen Center where I was director. Earlier that day, the Lord had allowed me to introduce an elderly lady to Him and I was pretty much pumped. As I turned north on one of our three main roads, I came in contact with royalty! Well, let me explain what I mean. A lady who happened to be a French Countess had flown to New York, flown on to Sarasota, rented a car and went to our largest mall.

Just as I passed an exit road from the mall, this lady ran a stop sign and hit me. My body went 171 feet up the road, in slow motion, flip-flopping like a carp out of water! My Voyager traveled through hedges, across a parking lot, and leaned up against a vacant building. Never even fell over! That ended my biking career. Both my knees were left pretty much damaged for life.

I bought a pickup truck. Named her Tonka. After 14 years and 400,000 miles, the Lord provided a replacement which I named Tonka 02. We’ve been together for more than three years and 90,000 miles.

Now, get ready for this, here comes the “irony”. On August 12, 2001, while coming home from morning church services, I was involved in an accident. No, I wasn’t hurt, but Tonka 02 was pretty well banged up in the right rear fender area. Two other vehicles were involved. One was a Volvo and the other was – here it comes – A MOTORCYCLE! What irony. I, Jerry, was creamed by a motorcycle. Wow! It seems that the Volvo had cut him off and he pretty much had to hit me. He thanked me several times for being there for him to hit. He envisioned his other option this way: he might easily have flipped his bike and ended up in a very busy lane of traffic. He said, “Thank God you were there” several times. At first, I explained that fixing my truck was a small thing compared to possibly helping him avoid serious injury or death.

After he repeated the “Thank God…” line, I finally said, “Sir, do you know this person you’re thanking?” He said, “Well, I don’t know Him personally, but I believe He exists.” What an opening, eh? (The “eh” is primarily for my Canadian readers.)

We’ve spoken on the phone and have plans to get together to visit. I hope he’ll give me further opportunity to share Jesus with him. Maybe you’ll shoot up a little prayer that this will happen.

Is God able to work things, even things meant for our harm, to our good? There are many lessons in this story. Please share with me the lessons that come to you! I always enjoy and answer e-mail from my readers.  Use the “Leave a Reply” box below!

– A LONG time ago, I had a cousin who never cooked. She decided to cook rice. She had rice from one end of the kitchen to the other. I can understand your dilemma. From then on, she read directions.

– Your mention of the young man who “cooked” grits reminded me of a story my father-in-law told about a fishing trip he took with 3 or 4 other men. When they got to the fishing hole all of them except one went to setting out bank lines while that one stayed in camp to build a fire and make coffee. When they came back into camp they noticed the coffee smelled really strong. They tried it and couldn’t drink it. They asked him how he had made it and he said, “Why, I used a pound of coffee to a gallon of water. Isn’t that the right way?” He had never made coffee before either.

– Enjoyed reading your story – I had to let my imagination run with the grits story, as I am from the Coal Regions of Pennsylvania and never tasted grits in my life, until about 3 years ago. My husband and I were down south, and we were served grits with several meals. Truthfully, I didn’t care for them, but it probably is a cultural thing. I grew up with a steady diet of meat, potatoes and vegetables, Italian food, pirogues, Slovak food, etc.

– I had never eaten grits until my son married a southern gal. She introduced me to them. Now we have grits frequently and I love every bite!!!!

– Ahh, this was good…. I know there have been many times when I’ve leaped before I looked…. seems to be my way of doing things 🙂 But that has changed in the last few years. I’m generally more thoughtful now. Just one more change the Lord has seen fit to make in me.

– OH my!!! Grits!!! Haven’t had any in years, Jerry!!! Now, as far as reading directions. Ain’t that the truth. If we only took the few minutes to read directions instead of winging it, we could save ourselves an awful lot of trouble. That made me think!!! For sure, next time I’m in a hurry, yet unsure, I’m still going to take the time to stop and read the directions!!! After all, we all need them!!!

– Papa J, this was GOOD, just “eggsactly” as I eggspected…NO YOKE!!!….teeheehee….and, I could invision the grits “all over the kitchen”. I also thought about the saying “haste makes waist {oops, I mean waste}”. Thanks again for sharing “life’s eggsperiences” with us.

– Grits are an experience all by themselves. I encountered them the morning after I had eloped in a Southern home, 8 x 12 (?) trailer that had a lean-to made out of wood with a wood stove for heat. Needless to say, after tasting what tasted like wood, I’ve never eaten them again!

– I’ve done too many embarrassing things that I’d have to ponder a bit on what might be worth sharing, but can easily relate to the man without the knowledge. Isn’t it amazing how often we make significant decisions with no advice, like reading the instructions, only to learn later that our decision was a disaster that could easily have been avoided had we just asked. Why, I wonder, is it so difficult for us to ask for advice? Why do men avoid maps as though they are contagious in some way? Isn’t the power of pride a powerful thing?

– My stepson was cooking Jolly Green Giant corn in a bag in the microwave the other night. I told him to read the directions. He thought he knew how to do it, so he didn’t read. It exploded all over the inside of the microwave, because he didn’t slit the bag as the directions said to do.