The Hitchhiker

Winter of 1963
One year sober

One winter night while driving home in a blinding snowstorm I was to be taught a great lesson. It had been a punishing work day and I struggled to keep the truck on the road. The ladders and scaffolds on the roof racks acted as sails in the bitter wind.
As I fought the icy road my only consolation was the safety net of snow-banks lining the narrow road. After working all day running up and down twenty-foot ladders hanging fluorescent fixtures I was dog tired. Working the two man job, alone, had been punishing. After ten hours in an unheated construction site I was frozen to the bone. With hands bleeding from handling the cold steel all day I cried out to God to help me finish the job. God did and I did. The mind chatter began.

Well. You about got our butt froze off.
We hope you feel pure and holy.
For the crying out loud,
how in the hell can you like this better
than curled up in a warm cozy tap with a shot and beer?
Oh, shut up. Don’t listen to them.
Pray, pray, go ahead you can feel good about what you did.
You’re OK. Don’t listen to them. Listen to us.

As I drove along I thanked God for His help. Feeling grateful I prayed.
“Send an alcoholic into my life, I want
to share what I’ve been given.”

But then I started fantasizing about how my prayers would be answered. Of course I didn’t want just any old common alcoholic. My alcoholic would be wealthy. He would be beholden to me and to express his gratitude he would help me out of the financial mess I was in.

Lost in my self-serving dream, I almost ran over the figure hugging a roadside snow bank. I slowed the truck to a stop a few yards down the road.
“Damn,” I yelled. “We’re out in the middle of nowhere, in god-awful weather fighting waist high drifts, a slick narrow road and here is some crazy jerk, on foot, going who knows where.”

What the hell did you stop for?
You’re lucky you didn’t skid off the road!
Come on. Come on, if you want a ride!
Move it fella. Shit, he’s taking all day.

He caught up to the truck and opened the passenger door. I motioned him to climb in and the moment I did I regretted it. The smell was horrible. Once he was in the cab, his stench almost brought tears to my eyes. He looked worse than he smelled. He had a filthy scarf wrapped around his head over his cap and tied under his chin as though he had a major toothache.
All I could make out was a of pair dark eyes peering over a mangled snot-covered beard. I didn’t ask him where he was going and he didn’t volunteer. He got in and just sat there not saying a word, thank God.

I went immediately back to my little dream.

As we approached the south end of town I asked him.
Where do you want to get off?
He waved his gloved hand and motioned just up ahead. As an afterthought he pointed to the entrance to the state mental hospital.
"Why"?
As I stopped at the gate he turned to me.
“Been thumbing four days; been a long way to get here.” I’m bone tired, hungry, cold and almost out of my mind. “I was about to give up in that snow bank when you happened by and then my prayers were answered. I knew I was in the right place since, against all odds; God got me here all the way from Houston, Texas. I heard that this state hospital actually offers treatment for alcoholics in a ward separate from the crazies. I’m ready to surrender; want to get sober.”

I sat there, stock-still in disbelief. What a fool! Here I had prayed for someone and my prayer had been answered. Totally wrapped up in myself I had ignored the obvious because God’s response was not to my specifications. If I had not stopped and had left him standing in the snowdrift I would have rejected God outright.
The figure disappeared into the darkness before I snapped out of it... I sat there for a while, muttering. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”
God had given me the most valuable of gifts and I didn’t like the wrapping. My committee of idiots struggled to regain a toehold in my gray matter.

Man, you’re one hell of an ass!
Ha, opportunity slaps you in the face
and you don’t even recognize it!
Some humble and caring ass you are!
“Shut up. Shut up. Ah, silence.”

Silence, except for One voice whispering.

“…To one of these…the least of your brethren….”

JF