'Mississippi Burning'
in Missouri ?
in Missouri ?
May '03, Pierce City, MO
I was working a temp debris clean up job in Pierce City, MO after that devastating tornado and I was told one morning to go – with my hard hat and my orange vest – to a corner of the town where every house had been destroyed and to just wait there for further instructions.
There were six debris lifter trucks working the site all of them from from South Carolina. One of them was being driven by a wiry old miserable bastard – right out of 'Mississippi Burning'. He and his truck suddenly drove slowly by me as I was standing there on the side of the street. And he just glared at me as he drove.
A couple of minutes later and he was driving by again. On this second loop he stopped right next to me, rolled down his window, and just started barking at me like the cantankerous old bastard that he was. And it seemed to me that barking wasn't all that he had in mind; I fully expected a sawed off shotgun to be staring me in the face at any second.
And I then looked to my right and just up the street on my side of it stood a fellow –
ANOTHER ONE OF THESE DIVINE ASSISTANTS -
that I keep telling everybody about that can just appear out of thin air. And HE really did suddenly just APPEAR as a twenty something caucasian fellow dressed in just jeans and a tee shirt. HE was suddenly just standing there on the side of the road about 10 yards away and was just looking across the road and just kind of chuckling to himself.
And then right out of the blue, as the truck driver was still barking, I was suddenly inspired to look right at him and say
“Hey, do you have a spare smoke? I'm all out.”
He suddenly stopped barking – and paused. He had been completely caught off guard. And then the truck driver just said “sure” and he threw me a smoke. And then he just drove off.
HE HAD SUDDENLY BEEN COMPLETELY DEFUSED!
THIS DIVINE ASSISTANT HAD DEFLECTED THE WHOLE THING!
THAT IDEA TO SUDDENLY ASK FOR A SPARE SMOKE WAS A GIFT FROM HIM!
THEY CAN DO THAT!
And then I lit my smoke and then when I looked back …
HE HAD ALREADY COMPLETELY DISAPPEARED !!!
BUT WHO WAS HE ?
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