I stopped in Columbia, South Carolina on my way North. It was a pretty uneventful place. I found a really nice park and asked someone why the signs were all over the place about not having grills or fires. He said it was because most of the parks in the city were built on leveled dumps and the methane gas would explode if someone had a fire going.
How true that was I didn’t know, but a couple of days after that conversation a lightning bolt struck the ground at a golf course a few miles north of that park and all I could think of was if it had hit that park what would have happened – KaBoom!
Anyway, South Carolina just didn’t feel right to me so I didn’t stay long. I ended up going into Charlotte, NC. It was now 6 months into 2012 and I still had no work. My money was once again running low, I still had no job and I still could not understand why.
Then one day, as I was sitting in McDonald’s having coffee and doing my job search, a man came and sat down in front of me and asked, “Are you in the same boat as that scum bag?” and he looked over at a drunk sitting a couple of seats over. I smiled and looked at him with kind of a brazen look and said, “No, I live in my car.” His name was Matt and he owned a car lot. He ended up offering me a job for $300 cash a week, which I gratefully accepted. I was able to rent a studio at the Residence Inn, put gas in my car, buy some clothes and get food to eat. In those 6 months I had learned how to live without a roof and most importantly my trust in God was strengthened even more that it already was. It seemed like life was getting back to “normal”.. or so I thought… Little did I realize what would lie ahead.
Matt turned out to be bi-polar. Just a few short months after starting to work for him, he walked up to me one day and told me to leave just as quickly as he had offered me the job, no reason, no explanation, just leave. I told him if I left, that I would not be back, but he was adamant that I leave, so I did. I was not worried, I believe God had provided that job, so He will provide another if that is what was meant to be… and within two days I had another job. It seemed life was once again on its way to getting back to normal until, yet another bump in the road.
In February 2013, my driver’s license was due to expire. Doesn’t seem like a big deal, but I had an Epileptic seizure back in 2009 that caused a car accident and now I need to have a Doctors authorization saying I am not having seizures in order to renew and keep my license. I had forgotten all about that, so when I went to the DMV, I found that Florida had my license blocked because I had not sent in the form. Not a problem. I can just get a neurologist and he can examine me and sign the form. I didn’t think it would be that difficult to find one, but it seemed next to impossible.
Since I was having trouble finding a neurologist that would see me quickly I decided to tell my new boss, Hossein, that he should find someone to take my place. But he said he could help me and I could keep working. I thought that was pretty nice of him and said, I would allow him to help me find the neurologist, but he needed to find someone that could drive the cars until I could get my license reinstated. He agreed. He also was able to find a neurologist that could see me, so I kept working and started living in my car again so I could pay for the visit. Unfortunately, the doctor would not sign the form. Instead, he increased the dosage of medication I needed to take. I realized at that time that I may never get my license back, so I had a decision I needed to make.
I told Hossein that he needed to hire someone to replace me because I may never be able to drive again. He offered to let me continue working, and would hire an additional person to do the driving, but I felt it would not be right, but I said I would stick around and help train the next person and help out, but that I didn’t think it was right to get paid to do a full time job when it was only part time, if that. What happened next completely blew my mind. I had never been so confused in my entire life.
Things were like a whirlwind, it all happened so fast. I started looking for another job again that would not require me to drive and I also started going to a group at the Calvary Church that helped people to improve their professional “appearance” including setting up your resume and how to interview better among other things. It turned out I helped them more than they helped me! But it felt good to be a part of something worthwhile and it gave me something different to do.
Then something happened at McDonald’s. I honestly cannot explain what happened. All I know is there was an older man that was like a regular that got mad at me one day and started yelling at me saying he was going to call the police and chased me out of there. What I did, I have no clue, but I left because I didn’t want to create a scene. (Personally I think he was jealous because I gave one of the cashiers my study Bible and she liked me because I was always nice to her, encouraging her to be patient and things would get better.)
When I left McDonald’s that day, I was shaking and flustered about what happened so I decided I would go to a church that was not far away and worship for a bit to get my wits back together. But when I got there and started walking toward the entrance, police cars were showing up and something in me said…. Absolutely do not go near that entrance. I decided to turn around and go someplace else. A couple of the people from the church started to approach me and I just said that I would go to the later service and walked away as quickly as I could. I didn’t go to my car though; I just walked down the street and found a place to sit. I was actually afraid of what was happening so I just prayed and prayed and prayed. I really did not understand what was going on, but I was worried that the man had actually said something really bad to the police. I stayed away from my car for the entire day and didn’t go back to it until I saw the parking lot totally empty. I was totally confused as to the events that happened that day, but I didn’t know that this was just the beginning of what was to come.
Wilderness Shield 