The Night We Almost Hit a Semi

The Night We Almost Hit a Semi

It was after midnight when my husband asked, “Can you see that?”

Lifting my gaze from the laptop screen, I peered through the windshield and saw a huge black rectangle lying across the interstate that was nearly indistinguishable from the darkness.

I gasped when I realized what it was—an overturned semi.

Braking, my husband swerved far into the right-hand lane to move around the truck. Another semi had already parked.

He parked behind it and said, “Where are the four-ways?”

I pushed the button.

He said, “We’re the second vehicle here.” Craning his neck, he said, “I need to go to her. I can see her standing on the passenger side window.”

I turned to look as well but had taken out my disposable contacts before we’d left the reunion and was therefore unable to make out details. After three hours of driving, my husband had taken off his shoes. We’d been so hungry after we left that we had stopped at Walmart and grabbed keto-friendly snacks: kippers, cheese, nuts, a bag of organic, pre-washed veggies.

The detritus was at my feet.

My husband said, “What should I do?”

Shaking my head, I murmured, “I don’t know. I just read about a father who got killed while trying to help someone on the interstate.”

His eyes widened as he glanced in the rearview mirror. “He’s gotta slow down.” Pumping his brakes to flash his lights, he said, “Buddy, you’ve got to slow down.”

When the approaching vehicle—unable to see the overturned semi—continued toward us, my husband said, “I’ve got to get out of here.” Shifting into drive, he gunned around the parked semi. People huddled in its headlights. One of them was on his phone.

We hadn’t driven a quarter of a mile when two police cars sped past us with their blue lights flashing.

Quietly, I asked, “What should’ve we done?”

“She’s okay, I think. I felt better that I could see her. The police will be there in no time.”

The exit we needed was just ahead. We pulled off and wound down through the mountain. I felt sick that my initial gut reaction had been self-preservation. Not so much for myself and my husband, but for our three daughters who were spending the night with their grandparents.

If something happened to us, who would take care of them?

Earlier that week, I had gone to check my email, and it instead took me to the home page’s headlines. At the top was an article about a woman who had been attacked on a train filled with other passengers. I’d felt incensed that no one had stepped in to save her.

Fast forward a few days and I had given in to the fear that my husband would be killed while trying to help that woman in the truck cab or that I would be killed while waiting in the car.

Self-sacrifice can never take place while consumed with self-preservation, and one of the greatest displays of self-sacrifice took place on United Airlines Flight 93.

Tears rolled down my face and laundry whites remained unfolded in my lap as I recently read the transcript between passenger Todd Beamer and dispatcher Lisa Jefferson.

Jefferson informed Beamer about the planes that had already hit the Twin Towers. Realizing Flight 93 was also being used as a weapon, Beamer decided to crash the highjacked plane to prevent it from taking numerous lives.

Beamer asked Jefferson to pray with him. Together, they recited the Lord’s Prayer and Psalm 23.

“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for though art with me.”

Beamer prayed, “God, help me . . . Jesus, help me . . .” and then he famously said, “Are you guys ready? Let’s roll.”

Regardless of how I replay that night with the semi—the darkness, the black rectangle, the woman standing on the window in the cab—I am not sure if my husband and I made the right decision. I do know that sometimes bystanders can cause more harm than good, and yet, what about that woman on the train who was brutally attacked while surrounded by bystanders?

What if someone hadn’t just stood there watching but had jumped in to help?

I do not want to be a bystander through life. I want to be able to discern when someone truly needs help, and then, like Todd Beamer, I want to run toward the darkness, knowing that the Light I carry can overcome it, even if that carrying does come with a cost.

Throughout history, men and women have bravely laid down their lives to save others. How can we overcome our own desire for self-preservation?