Okay for One Day

“I am so happy.” My daughter Val was eating breakfast at the kitchen counter one Saturday morning. “I have a good job, my own car, and a wonderful boyfriend. Everything is going great for me right now.”

          I don’t remember where she was working at the time, who her boyfriend was, or what car she was driving. She went through all three of those things with regularity at that time in her life. I do think she was all of nineteen years old that day.

          She hugged me as she left the house, climbed into her car, and drove off down our driveway, a fresh layer of snow under her tires. As her mother, having lived those nineteen years with her, I knew these good days would continue to wax and wane.  

          Five minutes later, the phone rang.

          “I ran in the ditch by Bob’s house.”

          Bob was an elderly neighbor who lived a quarter mile from our house. Just past his house was a small hill on a curve. On many winter days, my own car would gently slide through that piece of the road.

          “I’ll be right there.” Her stepdad was at work, and I was sure my vehicle couldn’t pull out her larger car, but I had to do something.

          When I got to the curve, I found her car buried in the ditch and Val standing at the side of the road, cell phone to her ear.

          “My boyfriend and his friends are on their way.” She said the boyfriend’s name, but, as I mentioned earlier, I don’t remember which one it was.

          “It’ll be okay.” I drew her into a hug.

          “Why me?” she asked. “I wasn’t even going that fast.”

          I doubted that, but didn’t tell her what I was thinking. I just repeated, “It will be okay.”

          And for that one day, it was okay.      

She had more than a few incidents with vehicles.
At least no one let her drive this truck. Picture is from 2014.