Dear Reader:

Whew! This Easter Family Gathering was one for the memories… preceding …the Easter luncheon. Plans were made weeks ago and then un-made due to Mother Nature and most recently a bizarre incident/ accident out of human control. So by the time we gathered yesterday… it didn’t take long for everyone to realize just how truly blessed we were to be altogether! It didn’t come easy this year!

It all started innocently enough … Tommy and Kaitlyn decided to bring all the family together ( Summerville and Mt Pleasant) and hold a Taste of the Masters picnic later in the afternoon Easter Sunday giving everyone a chance to attend church in the morning and watch the Masters together outside!

They ordered the whole ” picnic” from the Masters and then we just filled in with special Easter dishes and desserts from our extraordinary family member cooks!

Everything was on track until Mother Nature decided to send a spoiler alert-gusty winds and rain storms predicted for the weekend. Tommy and Kaitlyn’s outdoor picnic with outside televisions wasn’t going to work! John and Mandy came to the rescue and volunteered to host at their house… so we breathed a sigh of gratitude…we thought we had everything back in control… Masters Picnic inside now!!! Until … Good Friday!

I was getting all my supplies together Friday afternoon to take Sunday when the phone rang and I heard a sweet but hesitant voice coming from Eva Cate… telling me that something was wrong but hoping it would be okay.

I held the phone out and did a double/take… was this really Eva Cate’s voice? So mature and surprisingly calm… as she said ” Mom’s been in a car accident and daddy just left to check on her… mom was crying but we think okay… daddy will keep calling me to update me and then I will update you Boo.”

MANDY! By now it was all I could do not to jump in my car and drive over frantically but I knew logically with two wrecks already reported on the interstate (as Charleston residents were leaving work early to go out of town for Easter) that I would probably be stuck in traffic for hours.

Knowing Mandy had called John was temporarily reassuring but what had really happened… apparently Mandy had left to pick up Jake from a play date but Eva Cate didn’t know if he was in the car or not. Eva Cate told me her mom had asked if she wanted to ride too but she decided to just stay home with her dad.

I kept asking Eva Cate if she was okay and she said she was. So over the next half hour ( as John called in updates… we learned that Mandy was on Mathis Ferry Road on her way to pick up Jake when her peripheral vision saw a blue blur coming at her in the opposite direction-the car slammed into the passenger side sending her car spinning out of control until it came to rest at a stop sign.

Mandy’s air bag opened knocking off her sunglasses and knocking her head and neck upward… bruised, sore, finger displacement hanging on tightly to the steering wheel but overall miraculously spared.

The other driver apparently had a long list of driving accidents … her air bag didn’t open so she was ambulanced to the nearest emergency room to be checked… her car had spun too and came close to hitting a third car filled with teenagers waiting to pull out of a side street-no one hurt thankfully!

Mandy’s car was totaled… it wasn’t until later when I got the picture that I started shaking.. the ” what if’s “set in… if Eva Cate had decided to ride she would have been on the passenger side where the full impact took place… if Mandy had already picked up Jake… the same situation.

John and Mandy insisted that the family gathering would go on… so yesterday was a day filled with gratitude for life and God’s Presence in it.

I called Honey to thank her for my prayer cross and told her Saturday night about Mandy’s accident-I also told her two things happened minutes before Eva Cate called me… I noticed I had forgotten to put my prayer cross necklace on ( on coffee table) and slipped it over my head and then the doorbell rang-it was Fed Ex delivering my new Boo’s Blessing wooden cross plaque.

I climbed up on the porch bench and put it up on the back brick wall-then looked down at my wooden cross pendulum … and thought… ” Now all’s right with the world.” ( It would be… thanks to God)

Honey texted me yesterday and said for two days -last Thursday and Friday-she had me on her mind and felt an urge to call but didn’t as she was preparing for Easter and every time she feels that urge it usually means something is about to happen…

It did …but rest assured Honey God had it… the best backseat Driver around!

So until tomorrow… What could have been a tragic Easter this year turned into a renewed strength of life and the power of each other’s presence in unity and love!

The other Dingles had a great Easter too in Florida with friends! Spring break is on!