5 Minute Window

I don’t think I had taken more than 2 bites when I look up and gasp, ” Oh My God!”  My Mom looks at me and says, “what?’  I say I think Henry just walked in.  She said you have to be kidding are you sure?  Yes, I am sure, I would know him anywhere.  She turns her head and looks.  How can you be sure?  Oh trust me I am sure.  He stands in line and places his order, then he walks and sits at the table next to us, still not recognizing me.  You see I look very different, a lot better I think, but I now where glasses and my hair is shorter.  His back is to us.  I reach over and tap him on the shoulder.  He turns around.  I’m not sure if you remember me or not we used to date a long time ago, I say to him. My name is Doreen.  His eyes open wide and yes he says he remembers me, I look different.  He asks how I have been.  I tell him I am living in Florida, married,and  I show him pictures of my kids.  I ask him what he is doing.  He explains that he never married and has no children, that he is living up here.  I ask about his parents which he explains are fine, and that he is picking up lunch to take to them.  I tell him how I moved to Atlanta first and now currently live in Florida.  He then says Hi to my Mom, who is silent with disbelief.  It is so weird to run into someone so long ago from your past.  We have a few more minutes of awkward conversation, and then his order is called.  He has to go, he needs to get lunch to Mom and Dad and then he needs to get to a settlement.  We both agree it was good to run into each other and maybe we can catch up later.  So many questions about how life has been.  You wonder once in awhile about someone, knowing nothing of how their life is or where they are and then in a matter of minutes one day, you find out.  It is wonderful and weird at the same time and a little scary.  You see I always wondered how life had turned out for him.  I never in a million years thought I would ever get to know much less run into him.  How strange.  It was a 5 minute window, like I said before, a few minutes either way for both of us and we would have missed running into each other.  Now the question becomes, Why now?  Why ever?  With out ever seeing it coming my life just got the biggest shake up of my life.  Like I said earlier this was a big trip for me this time and my life was needing a direction for happiness.  Was this God’s way of giving me direction?  Sure is a burning bush!!  I was left to ponder, but the task at hand was to talk to my Mom and Step Dad.  Running into Henry wasn’t the reason, that had already been determined.  But was there a chance for happiness at some point with all this?

On the morning of April 23, 2004 I got up very early as I had a 7:00 am flight.  I would have to change planes in Atlanta before my final destination of Washington - Dulles.  The day was beautiful, boy I thought what a great day to fly.  Now usually my early flight is delayed.  Why I don’t know, I guess because I am flying out of a small airport.  How many times has my first flight been delayed?  I can’t even count.  I am so used to my first flight being delayed that is was what I had come to expect.  I remember that day getting on the plane and taking off on time, How weird, but also enjoying not sitting on the plane waiting to take off hoping and praying I would make my connection.  I get to Atlanta with time to spare.  I even have time to get something to snack on and use the restroom.  I get to my gate in Atlanta and low and behold my next flight is on time and the plane is there.  I am thinking wow this is my lucky day.  I call Mom and tell her I am on time and will see her shortly.  As I board my plane in Atlanta I also remember thinking , how weird both flights are smooth and on time, I can’t remember the last time that happened.  I had gotten used to the delays and having to change flights because of them.  I had in the past done a lot of sitting in the Atlanta airport.  I didn’t know it at the time but time was working to have me at El Taco when I was supposed to be.  You can see all this when you look back but that day I just thought, how nice I will get up to Dulles with no problems.  Looking forward to my lunch and trip.  I get on the plane from Atlanta to Washington - Dulles and we land almost to the minute on time.  I make it through the airport to baggage, my Mom is right there.  We go over to get my checked luggage and it is one of the first pieces off the plane.  We get my luggage and we are in the car on the way to Manassas, so on time and really earlier than I had thought.  It is about 11:30.  We talk on the way and I remember even commenting on how smooth the day had gone and how unusual that was, but I wasn’t complaining.  I am hungry and looking forward to a hard taco and burrito ( sounds like a lotbut it isn’t).  We make it from the airport to Manassas in no time.  No traffic, what a break.  So basically in 5 hours from 7:00 to 12:00 noon I am turning into the parking lot of El Taco after leaving home that morning.  We walk into El Taco wait in line to order.  We order.  You order at one window and they give you a number and you go sit down and then they call your number and you pick up your food.  We are sitting there talking and they call our number and I go get our food.  Boy that was fast and I am happy because I am hungry.  We are sitting in the middle of the restaurant I am facing the front and the front door and order window, my Mom has her back to the front.  We start to eat.   To be Continued…….

El Taco

When I look back, I can see the events as they all fell together.  Of course at the time I had no idea.  It all started a couple of days before my flight on April 23, 2004.  I had a flight booked to fly home to visit my Mom and Step Dad in Manassas, Virginia.  My plan was to sit down and discuss with them my desire to divorce and to move back home to Manassas. They had know idea that is why I was coming up I wanted to tell them face to face.  I had been away since I was 20 years old and all the kids were out in the world and I missed my family in Northern Virginia so I thought this might be the place to go.  This had been a big decision coming for awhile.  I had been married for 16 years and we were both unhappy.  I had a couple of months earlier told my husband at the time that I was going to leave I just didn’t know when and to where.  Because of my unhappiness, every night I would say a small prayer.  Just a couple of simple words “Show me the direction for my life.”  You see I have always been one of those people who just move though life at warp speed always thinking I know everything and all the ways I should go.  My preacher, a wonderful man at First United Methodist Church, would tell me to listen for god’s answer.  He said God sometimes talks in the quiet times.  So I was trying real hard to do this, to be patient and follow his way this time in hopes I would wind up in a good place.  I would tell God in those moments that I really don’t get the quiet voice that I am more of a Burning Bush kinda gal.  That if he wanted me to know his way, it was going to have to smack me in the face.  

My Mom worked full time so usually when I would fly up my Step Dad who is a teacher would pick me up at the airport because he had a little more flexibility to his schedule.  We would always leave the airport and go to my Mom’s house.  That was the normal pattern.  So a couple of days before my flight I get a call from my Mom saying that she wanted to pick me up to spend time with me  so she was going to take a half day off.  I think “wow how nice”  My flight was scheduled to arrive a little before noon so as we talked I suggested that being she was picking me up that we should go to lunch.  Something we never get to do.  She said ok and that I could pick any place I wanted to go.  After some discussion I suggested El Taco.  A little Taco restaurant that has been around since I was a kid and a real staple of my diet as a teenager.  I loved their food and hadn’t been there in years.  My Mom loves their food also, so we agreed.  Mom would pick me up and them lunch at El Taco.  To be continued……….

Sometimes moments in life change our lives forever.  A few minutes that put us in the right place at the right time.  I like to call it the 5 minute window.  I never gave this much thought, just like most people, until the day everything went just right.  At the time I didn’t know it, but when I looked back you could see everything falling into place.  It was that moment that I was hit with the BIG question “WHY?”  Why now?  What was the purpose of everything happening just right that day - for this moment?  Life gives us many challenging and puzzling questions, one is “WHAT IF I HAD BEEN 5 MINUTES EARLIER OR LATER?”   I am devoting this website to answering and exploring that question.  I like to think about the 5 minute window as the “Tumbler’s Of Life”, one event tumbling into the next - charting the course of our days, everyday.

Red lights in traffic that irritate us and hold us up, why that light that day?  What if the light had been green?  And I was 5 minutes earlier down the road?  How different would my day have been?

There are a million small decisions and moments that affect our lives everyday, most we will never give a single thought to.  Until you are faced with being in the right place at the right time.  You start wondering “WHY?” and you start looking back at the events and moments that caused you to be right there at that time.  Was this meant to be?  Could I have changed it?  What do I do now with this opportunity?

My day was April 23, 2004.  That morning when I got up I had no idea that my life would be changed forever.  I had no idea life was setting me up for a 5 minute window, where I would run back into my now husband, Henry.  Why is this so special?  Henry and I first dated back in fall 1978 until Spring 1980, I was 18 when I first met Henry.  We broke up and for 23 years we NEVER heard from each other, never talked to each other, never knew anything about each other.  For 23 years our parents lived in the same houses that we grew up in, in the same town, we both visited often going out to eat, shop and in 1989 Henry moved back permanently to live here in Manassas, Virginia.  We never ran into each other, that is until April 23, 2004.  Why that day?  Why then?  Why at all?  Henry and I will each tell our sides of that incredible day, you will see how things just worked, or as I like to say the “Tumbler’s all fell into place”.  For Henry and I to be at the same place at the same time for a 5 minute window of opportunity to re-connect.  And honestly 5 minutes earlier or later and we would have missed each other.  You will see from our stories that a lot had to go right that day.