The Volkswagen that Couldn’t

1978

Shortly after my wife and I were married, we decided to drive to Canada to visit her parents. We were still starving students and had to make the trip in my wife’s orange Volkswagen Beetle. The route required us to cross through a few mountain ranges somewhere in Montana. On this occasion, my wife was driving. We were following a big freight truck as we began to climb up a steep mountain. The truck began to slow down as the hill became steeper. This stretch of highway had only two lanes. Thus, the only way to get by the big truck was to pass him on the left.

There was another car behind us. We both grew impatient to get around the slow moving truck, but the on-coming traffic was too heavy. The minutes of waiting for an opportunity to pass the truck became agonizing. The tension and the stress were building. Finally, a gap in the on-coming traffic presented our best chance to pass the truck. Lori pulled the beetle into the left lane and put the pedal to the metal. To our great dismay, the Volkswagen did not surge forward with a burst of speed as hoped. One quarter mile ahead, another vehicle was speeding toward us in the left lane. Our poor little Volkswagen was not making much progress getting around that truck. The situation was getting very tense.

Meanwhile, the car that had been behind us pulled up nearer to the truck, making it impossible for us to move back into the right lane to avoid a head-on collision. Now, we were both truly frightened. The Volkswagen was not going to get around the truck in time. Lori took the only option left. She braked hard to allow the truck and the car behind it to move ahead. We slipped back into the right lane and out of harm’s way just as the on-coming car flew by with its horn blowing.

I will never forget the expression on the face of the driver of the car that had been behind us. As we were braking to get back into the right lane, I could clearly see a look of amusement as he sped ahead on the right. I will never know if his actions that day were deliberate, but in my heightened state of distress, I assumed he had intentionally placed our lives in danger just so he could have a good chuckle.

For the next 20 or 30 minutes, I was silently fuming. I entertained all manner of grisly methods of exacting revenge on this pathetic excuse for a human being. My fantasies involved the use of weapons such as sledge hammers, machetes and double barreled shotguns. I was so consumed by my anger and indignation that I could not rationally analyze what was happening to me. At length, I finally realized that I was only prolonging my mental anguish by feeding my rage with thoughts of revenge. Finally, after a long time, I was able to listen to the still, small voice inside me. That voice told me that the only way to become triumphant in this situation was to adopt a spirit of forgiveness. Then, and only then, was my personal peace restored.

In retrospect, that driver did me a great favor that day. He helped me learn a valuable lesson early in life that has served me well ever since.