Two weeks ago, I took my car for its MOT. The car was fine, passed the test but as I was leaving the shop, the mechanic mentioned that I’d need to replace my front brake pads and one of my tyres, ‘probably within a couple of months’. For some reason (unlike me, especially when it comes to spending a chunk of money), I decided I should just fork out the money and do it straight away, so I booked the car in and a few days later, the work was done.

Little did I know what would happen today.

This afternoon, my mum and I were on our way to a family gathering.The sun was shining and we were nipping down the country lanes at around 40 miles an hour.  Now lest you think this was a blissful Sunday afternoon jaunt through the countryside, I should mention that just minutes before, my mum and I had a disagreement. In the grand scheme of things, it wasn’t over anything very important, but there was a cross silence between us and as I nipped along, suddenly there was this inexplicable nudge in my ribs to ‘be alert, to be on the lookout’.  

No sooner had that thought formed in my head when a car shot over a give way/stop sign to my left, racing madly (without looking) at about 60 miles an hour.  

Everyone says that in a life and death situation, everything slows down, but that’s exactly what happened. It was as though I was watching an action replay of the situation in slow motion. I slammed my foot on the brake, watched as my mum stretched her hands out on to the dashboard and I vaguely remember us both sort of crying out/shouting.  

And then the inexplicable happened.  Remember that scene in The Matrix, where time slows down and Neo is able to deftly dodge bullets? Well, this afternoon, it was almost as though something or someone pushed my car back or slowed it down. I can’t describe it any other way, except to say it was like hitting a supernatural force field which stopped me from crashing at high speed into the side of the black Ford (the only details I registered).  

I must have come within less than a foot of having a major crash, the driver of the Ford screamed on forward, seemingly oblivious to what he/she had just done. We sat there for a second, dazed, thanking God for saving our lives and immediately grabbed hands and said, ‘I’m sorry’ for the disagreement we’d had earlier. There’s nothing like a brush with eternity to put your life and its problems into perspective. 

We carried on with our journey and as soon as we got onto the motorway, (before I’d said a word), my mum said to me, ‘it was like something stopped us…something pushed us back…’.  

We continued on our way, dazed, thankful, me wondering what might have happened if I’d  not had that strange feeling of needing to ‘be alert’ just seconds before, me also wondering what could have happened if I’d not changed my brake pads a few weeks ago.

Did something supernatural save us today? I am sure of it.