Divine Intervention?

I have lived through a handful of incidents that could have closed the book called My Life but for the intervention of an all-powerful and divine entity, who according to my mother, was looking out for me. She would tell me, “HE saved your life.” Of course, she meant God. We often use terms like “I just got lucky” when we manage to live through some event, that we shouldn’t have. But, think about it, was it really luck or, was it possibly, Divine Intervention?

Here are a handful of stories, three of which happened when I was very young and there wasn’t anything I could have done to extricate myself from the situations. The last story happened much later in my life, when I should have known better than to get in that situation in the first place.

My mother and father told me this one, because I had no memory of it. Way, way back in 1943, at about eighteen months of age, I got very sick. I had a terrible cough and a fever. Nasty gooey stuff was oozing from my nose and mouth. My parents didn’t know what to do, so they took me to the Budapest Children’s Hospital, which at the time, luckily for them, was only a few blocks from our flat. We had no car. So, they bundled me up and carried me to see my doctor. It took him very little time to diagnose what was ailing me. It was Diphtheria. You more than likely have never heard of this nasty disease, unless you are in my age group or have read about it in a medical publication.

It’s a nasty, infectious disease caused by the bacteria Corynebacterium diphtheriae. The infection started in my nose and quickly spread to my throat and down into my lungs. The toxins forming were destroying all the healthy tissue in their path and were causing an ugly green-grey membrane to form all over every orifice and surface of my air passages, producing even more toxins.

As this nasty goop spread through my throat and windpipe, I was experiencing great difficulty breathing. The doctor informed my parents that I couldn’t be laid down in my crib because once in a flat position, I would most certainly choke to death. Hence, until the antitoxins and antibiotics would take effect, my mother and father had to hold me in an upright position in their arms and walk me back and forth throughout our tiny apartment for something like forty-eight hours straight, in order to keep me from falling asleep and choking.

The doctor had offered them to leave me at the Children’s Hospital, so that the nurses could do all the walking, but mom and dad didn’t want to entrust my well-being to anybody else. Following the forty-eight-hour period, and regular administration of the prescribed medication, the infection started to slowly break up and my parents told me (years later) that I started breathing a little easier. But even after I started looking and feeling better, my mother was still afraid to lay me down for fear that something might happen. After about a week, with the last dose of the medication, the infection went away. Fortunately for me and for the folks, I recovered as is obvious by my telling you this story.

My folks told me, years later, that after the ordeal, I slept for what seemed like a week, with my mother frequently checking in on me to make certain that I was still breathing. I owe both mom and dad a big one, just for those first forty-eight hours. According to them however, quite a few children still perished from this dreaded disease because some parents were slow in taking their children to the doctor’s or simply ignored the symptoms until it was too late. My mother firmly believed that a divine hand had interceded on my behalf, which is why I recovered.

I had barely recovered from my bout with Diphtheria, when I had another medical emergency which landed me in the hospital. On his way back from the Russian Front, my father had bought a beautiful icon, which is a religious artifact done in gold and framed in a gilded, inlaid wooden frame with glass in front. My parents had decided to move it from its former location and to hang it above my crib so that the saint pictured therein, and the golden angels would watch over me.

They should have known better by this time, that I was a curious little bugger, and perhaps the icon should have been hung a bit higher up on the wall. They thought that it was out of my reach. I however, had discovered that my reach was slowly getting longer. I could grab knick-knacks off the ornate little table next to the crib and bounce them off the floor; and so, my mother moved the little table farther away. With that challenge out of my reach, I started exploring other possibilities. The icon finally hooked me. I just had to check it out, up close, but it was just too high, I thought. For a while, I ignored it.

Then one day, I figured out this new maneuver. By raising one leg all the way up and over the top rail of the crib, I got a little lift. Very ingenious, I thought, with a sneaky little smile on my chubby face. Now, I speculated, if this maneuver gives me enough of a boost, I might just reach my goal, a very close examination of the golden icon. It was so pretty and shiny and I wanted to check out the angels and the saint, very closely. No harm in that, right?

As the folks were sitting on the divan (couch), relaxing and listening to the radio, I made my move without much fanfare, sort of nonchalantly. After a few disappointing slips, my leg was finally hooked across the rail. The next thing, my hand was stretching and reaching for the icon. With a little grunt and one extra push of my diaper-wrapped heiny, I was finally able to touch it. With another grunt and a final push, I hooked the frame with my little fingers and dislodged it completely.

The icon came crashing down on the edge of the crib, along with yours truly and we ended up in a heap of broken glass and the icon separating from the frame and me coming eyeball to eyeball with the saint and the golden angels pictured therein. I let out a blood curdling scream (I was told) which made my mother and father jump up from the divan and rush to the crib. They could see that not only had the icon broken apart and there were glass shards all over my crib, but a jagged shard was stuck in the top of my skull. I was bleeding profusely (I was told) and screaming at the top of my lungs. They literally ran me to the hospital.

When they told me the story years later, my parents said that I had been lucky that the glass hadn’t pierced my thin skull and all I had needed was but a few tiny stitches. Which brings me to my puzzlement when on occasion I had been called ‘thick skulled’ or ‘hard headed.’ Now which one was it, thin skull or thick skull? But I digress. To this day, if I softly run my finger along the ridge of my skull, I can still feel the inch-and-a-half or so scar from 1944. For the second time in a very short period of my life, my mother said that God’s angel has kept that glass shard from going all the way into my little brain.

By the way, my parents had the icon restored to its former appearance after the incident and hung it back up on a totally different wall, far, far away from my crib. It was one of the items my father regretted leaving behind when we had to leave Hungary. It would have taken up too much space in either suitcase they packed with essentials. Besides, they had firmly believed that in a few weeks’ time, the war would be over, and we’d be back home…

•••

As Hitler and his minions were chased out of Budapest, Stalin was moving in with a million-men army to take over. While this was happening, my parents decided that it was time to get out.

A few days later, in the last days of February 1945, we became part of a long column of refugees heading for the Austrian border and safety. Somewhere, along the way, on a road skirting the Danube River which at this time of the year was swollen and roaring along in a muddy, gray fury, our column was unable to avoid the bombardment of a small industrial town by Russian bombers.

Our column was forced to head for cover under the trees along the sloping banks of the Danube where quite a bit of snow and slush still covered the ground. My mother had been carrying me at the time because I had gotten tired of walking. My father was carrying our belongings and had lagged a bit behind. Oftentimes when the going was slow, I and all the other smaller kids were allowed to toddle alongside our parents to give them a bit of a break; until us wee-people started whining.

On this particular occasion, my mother had picked me up to stop the complaining. Nobody really knew what the planes were bombing. By this time, they had pretty much destroyed all bridges, supply lines and factories. There wasn’t much left of this little town but great big mounds of busted masonry, splintered wood and chunks of cement. Then again, maybe the Russian pilots didn’t want to run out of fuel, so they just dumped their load (of bombs), as they were often accused of doing. Who knew?

The Russian Tupolev Tu-2, twin-engine bombers got very close to the road we had been following. The column broke up; everyone scattering for cover in all directions. Russian pilots had been known for strafing anything that moved on the ground, be it soldiers or grandmothers with little children. They later claimed, believe it or not, that they couldn’t tell civilians and military apart from way up there. Through the smoke, dust and stench of metal and explosives from all the bombs, people were desperately looking for safe places to hide.

As my mother was running for cover under the trees along the bank which dropped toward the river, the blasts kept going off in all directions, rocking the ground underneath her feet and adding to the thick haze and the stench. She was holding me as tightly as she could, me in my big fur-lined coat when she slipped in the slush and the concussion ripped me right out of her arms as she fell.

I was sent flying and bouncing down the steep bank toward the swollen, swiftly flowing muddy, bloody river. She of course let out a scream, terrified that I would keep on hurtling right into the gray fury to drown.

My father, who had dropped the load he had been carrying as he himself had hit the ground, scrambled to his feet and took off after my mother. They were both slipping and sliding in the muck while ripping their clothing and getting all scratched up on the bramble and brush. They later told me that all they could do was watch me sliding and bouncing downhill. They were certain that I would end up plunging into the turgid, mucky waters.

Someone “up there” must have been watching over me. As I kept sliding and bouncing along the snowy river bank toward oblivion, my descent was suddenly halted. A rather large boulder, very close to the edge of the surging turbid waters, stopped my progress. Others hadn’t been so lucky. Some ended up in the river and had to be pulled out by brave men and women on the slippery banks; while some went under and succumbed to the treacherous swirling waters.

When my folks finally got to me, my mother said that I was laughing like this had been some sort of a whacky carnival ride. I was completely unhurt. The worst thing that had happened was my face was smeared with muck. Here I must interject a small factoid: my mother was a clean-freak. She had always kept me spotlessly clean.

So, the very first thing she did was to pull out her handkerchief, wet it with her mouth and start furiously cleaning my face. This is what my dad told me, every time he retold this story. The other thing I want to remind you of is, this happened in late February and as I said, it was still rather frosty. There was still snow and slush all over the place, so my folks had me bundled up. I was actually wearing this thick large fur winter coat which was called a Bunda in Hungarian. As it was a couple sizes too big, it went down to the top of my shoes and was topped off with a fur hat made of the same hide, tied under my chin. This getup made me look like I belonged to some lost Eskimos tribe, way up North Pole way; Nanook Kapus at your service.

With all that padding, no wonder I hadn’t felt a thing.

My mother thought for sure that it had been divine intervention that saved my life that day. I on the other hand firmly believe that it was that very large boulder; however, I never challenged what she wanted to believe. Anyway, how did that big chunk of the lithosphere; you know, a rock, just happen to be there, in that exact spot? You know, this time, she might just have been right. But whatever it was, I am here writing the story about it. Amen!

This last mishap took place in the Spring of 1966. I was now married. My youngest daughter had been born just a couple of months prior and we were moving from cramped quarters in Berkeley, to a nice house in Oakland that a good friend of my parents had offered to rent to us, for a very reasonable amount; would you believe $100 a month. Most importantly, my girls Christina and Gizella would have a nice yard to play in, when they got a little older. And, Saint Augustine church and school, were right across the street; which they both eventually attended.

My brother-in-law Charlie and I had rented a trailer for the move. We had boxed up all our belongings and made several trips back and forth between Berkeley and Oakland. When we had unloaded the last box at our new abode, Charlie and I were going to return the trailer to the rental company and stop off for a couple beers at our nearest watering hole, on Telegraph Ave., in Oakland. In retrospect, that might have been our first mistake.

We were both overheated in our t-shirts after all the loading and unloading and were enjoying a couple of brewskies. Suddenly, one of us—it might have been me—said “You wanna drive up to Tahoe and try our luck?” Why, I don’t know. So, after we finished our second beer, we got into Charlie’s 1959 Black Dodge Charger and after filling up at the Richfield gas station across the street, we headed for Ashby and the Bayshore highway. In 1966, the freeway part only went a couple miles past Richmond. After that, if I remember correctly, it was mostly two-lanes, all the way to Sacramento.

We were rolling along at a good clip, while listening to the latest hits on KEWB. Back in those days, Highway 50, which took you to Lake Tahoe, didn’t bypass Sacramento, in fact, you had to drive through town for a couple miles. At some point, before we left the city, Charlie said, “I’m getting tired, why don’t you drive the rest of the way?”

We left Sacto city limit and KEWB with me at the helm. I was watching the speedometer and we were cruising right along with no problems. As we got to the Sierra foothills, traffic had thinned out considerably as this was midweek. Pretty soon, I was navigating the twisty-windy road up the west face of the Sierras in the final thirty to forty miles to North Shore. Before I forget, back in those days, because there were no freeways, traffic moved a lot slower. So, as we had left Oakland at around four in the afternoon, by the time I started my ascent of the Sierra, it had slowly gotten darker and, it got overcast. I turned on the headlights. Also, remember, back in Oakland, the spring weather had blessed us with a balmy seventy-degree temperature, which is why we were wearing t-shirts. Half way up our climb, I noticed snow on the side of the road and under and around the trees. Pretty soon, there was a thin layer of the white stuff on the road surface. The charger had no chains on. As a matter of fact, I hadn’t even noticed a sign indicating that chains would be required. So, I slowed down a bit and started paying a lot more attention at how slick the surface of the roadway had gotten. Charlie was snoozing peacefully in the passenger seat and my eyes were on the road and my hands were holding the steering wheel a little tighter.

Up to this point, I could only see headlights a couple of miles behind us, down the serpentine, and no tail lights at all ahead of us. We were climbing higher and higher on the twisting road until I passed the sign saying, “Echo Summit – 7,377 ft.” Just as I glanced at the sign, a red light popped up, right in front of the Charger.

Out of nowhere, this car had suddenly appeared in front us. I slammed on the brakes. Not a smart thing to do on slick road surfaces. Instead of sliding to a halt, the Charger started spinning around like a top, right to the edge of roadway. As we’re spinning, Charlie suddenly woke up. “What the Hell is going on?” he exclaimed.

“Some idiot slammed his brakes on, right in front of us,” I blurted, as the Charger had slowed the spin down and came to halt, pointing in the wrong direction and very close to the edge of a 2000 ft drop. I broke out in a sweat and my heart was racing. Of course, by this time, the car in front, had disappeared.

“I better drive the rest of the way,” Charlie grumbled.

In my short 24 years on planet Earth, this was the second time that I had involuntarily gotten this close to the edge of the precipice, literally. Remember earlier, in 1945, when I almost ended up in the broiling Danube river? This time as well, it all could have ended at the bottom of the canyon, maybe in the Truckee river, except that this time, I really believed it had been divine intervention that had prevented it.

As Charlie drove down the other side of the Sierra toward the “Y,” where highway 50 splits, with one branch going North and the other South, he practically shouted, “I was having this nice dream, the next thing I see was a two-thousand-foot drop and the bottom of the canyon sliding by. I thought for sure we were goners.”

Nothing memorable happened after that. We got to Harrah’s casino and we both played Blackjack, until we ran out money. It was lucky that we had filled the tank on the Charger because all we had left in our pockets was small change. And way back then, neither of us had any credit cards. By 2 am, we were on our way back home, with our tails between our legs. We were trying to figure out what story were going to tell our wives. See, we had told them about getting a couple of beers after we returned the trailers, and both of the sisters knew that it shouldn’t have taken this long. We had some “splaining” to do…

Now, allow me to go back to the beginning, momentarily. We escaped from Budapest at the end of February 1945. A couple of years later, we found out from a friend who had stayed behind, that within a couple days of our departure, the four-story building we lived in, was leveled. I saw first- hand, the pile of rubble that was left, on a visit to Budapest in 2008.

Believe or not, I am certain that a higher power exists that looks after all of us. Call it God or whatever you wish. But the next time you make it through some horrific experience; think about it. It might just have been Divine Intervention, and maybe just say, Thank you God!