Orchestrated - All Things Work Together for Good

Tom and his Jeep

(Excerpt from  Bedeviled )

More often then we know, I believe someone who loves us, either God, an angel, or a deceased relative, exerts their power over this world and shoves us in a better direction. I think they give us a chance to wake up and smell the coffee, if we possibly can, and avoid making big mistakes. I guess they can’t force a person to do something or to change, but they can make things happen which will head off the worst of our mistakes, at least for a little while.

Shortly after we’d finally sold our country house and moved to LA, there was an incident which involved the very person who was Tom’s secret temptress and whose siren song had such great power over his mind and will. Yeah, her. You’d think he’d have learned his lesson. But no, he came back for more. According to what I learned from Pam Coronado later, the temptress had insisted that before she’d make good on any of her career promises for Tom, he must leave me. Well, he was doing his best to accomplish that. Now he’d relocated to the west coast and was just waiting for her to say the word. But I was still hanging on. I hadn’t gotten the message because I wasn’t listening to what Tom didn’t say.

This incident is another one of those funny coincidences that, now that I know a bit more about how the spirit world works, I believe was no coincidence at all, but entirely orchestrated. As I remembered this minor disaster, I was reminded, and not for the first time, of the insight of a medical doctor, Dr. Tony Cicoria, I had read about who had a near death experience. He was struck by lightning, died, but chanced to be standing by a nurse who knew exactly what to do to resuscitate him. He came back a completely new man. He was still a doctor, but now he began studying music for the first time, and became a composer and a concert pianist. His whole life blossomed in a different direction. His comment on what he'd seen and experienced during his near-death experience was that "It's all so orchestrated.", referring to the events of our lives. ("Glimpsing Heaven: The Stories and Science of Life After Death", Judy Bachrach )

What happened next is a perfect example of how things are orchestrated to keep us headed toward happy outcomes.

Once we got settled in Hollywood, the confusing things Tom had done back east appeared in hindsight to be simply the result of the demands our peculiar careers made on us. I was completely unsuspicious that there was someone secretly working against our marriage and trying to get Tom to leave me or that he was an eager and willing partner in that scheme. In the blog I wrote about Tom’s career, after he’d passed away, I’d written about this adventure as one of the most romantic nights of my life. When I was given the name of my rival, this incident was probably far more important than I would ever have guessed in saving my marriage and keeping the home fires burning, romantically speaking.

We’d been in California barely three months, just enough time to get settled. It was our first Fourth of July on the west coast. We were invited to a big barbecue at the home of a woman who I thought of as simply one of our acquaintances. She’d moved back to LA, where she was from. There would be lots of other actors and people at the party who we knew from back east. I was looking forward to seeing several of our old friends again. But other than that, this gathering was completely inconsequential in my mind. We might hear some interesting gossip, but these actors and even the woman giving the party were all soap people. According to Tom, we’d sold our house and come to LA cold turkey to leave the world of soap opera behind and move up in the industry.

Once again, I was completely misled. Tom apparently was in hot pursuit of this woman and a job on a California soap opera. She was the reason we were in Hollywood. That is now obvious when I think of all the times we’d gotten together with her over the previous several years. She seemed to be always hovering on the edge of our life.

The party was at her beautiful beach home along the California coast. It was a very pleasant party. Nothing stands out particularly in my memory. However, while I was innocently socializing with other guests, Tom and the other woman were no doubt having cozy little confabs right under my nose and probably figuring how soon Tom could get free of his wife and be available to her in all the ways she required.

Yes, my beloved was coldly calculating leaving me, suddenly, heartlessly and without warning. But, I guess I was very naïve not to realize what I was up against. Tom was an earthy guy who wanted the good things in life. She had the gorgeous house on the beach, and the means to offer him fame and wealth. Partnering with her would have made him a Hollywood player overnight. Maybe. All I had to offer, now that he’d thrown away our house and his New York career, was love on a shoestring budget and frail, rather vague hopes of future success. Of course, he was tempted. However, we were both about to get some big time help when we needed it most from the powers that rule the universe.

It was late evening on that Fourth of July when we started the long drive home. We sailed down the Pacific Coast Highway in our revved up postal jeep with the top off and the starry nighttime sky over our heads. We cruised along in the balmy Los Angeles twilight, buffeted by the salty ocean breezes. It was truly California dreaming.

As he drove down the highway, Tom was off in his own world and seemed quite content. He was always great at logistics, so I'm sure he was figuring out things like whose sympathies he could prevail upon to take me in, when he tells me he’s through with me. Or perhaps it would be easier if he moved in with someone friendly to his side of the story. Which is that he's leaving me because? I’m sure he'd figured out that the 'my wife doesn't listen to me' excuse was pretty weak and was trying to come up with something more convincing.

However, as we approached the Sunset Boulevard turnoff, everyone was going home from their beach barbecue, and the traffic was bumper to bumper as far as the eye could see. Since we had to go from one end of Sunset all the way to the other end in Los Feliz, it looked to be a long, slow ride home. The traffic was creeping at a snail’s pace. At that moment, the spirit world stepped in. Suddenly, the jeep's engine temperature shot into the red zone. Steam billowed out from under the hood. We pulled off to the side of the road, and let more steam off.

Once the engine cooled, Tom checked the radiator; it was bone dry. It must have sprung a leak. We were stuck. Nothing to do but try to get to a gas station to refill it. But in this traffic, the jeep will overheat again very quickly because there won't even be any airflow to cool the engine. It was stop, go, stop, go, making agonizingly slow progress in the heavy traffic. At last, a couple of blocks ahead, we spotted a gas station, our salvation. Except when we arrive, it's closed. Late at night on the Fourth, everything will be closed. Bummer.

Angry and disgusted, Tom grabbed a plastic jug from the back seat, found a water spigot at the station and filled the radiator with water. Then he filled the jug. It won’t be enough water to last the whole way home, but maybe there will be another gas station further on.

However, we were at the far northern end of Sunset Boulevard, where it winds through some very scenic, but mostly undeveloped and remote areas. There are miles of deep canyons, a state park, a couple of college campuses and some sparsely settled areas with expensive mansions, hiding in acres of landscaping. But there are no gas stations.

We crept slowly homeward. Tom loved cars, and that jeep was always a favorite of his. What a blow it must have been to him for it to break down, tonight of all nights, just as he was getting ready to launch himself as a free man.

However, once I realized that the steaming engine wasn't going to blow up, I wasn't upset at all. In fact, I thought it was actually kind of fun. We were in no hurry. Tom assured me the problem with the car was easily fixed and wouldn’t break our bank account. The drive along the fabled Sunset Boulevard was taking us on a leisurely journey through some of the most gorgeous scenery in Los Angeles. Everywhere we had to pull over and park provided a stunning scenic vista of distant lights dotting the fragrant hillsides.

Once we reached the pricey, but more residential areas, we had to pull off onto side streets, where every house was someone’s dream home. We’d park beneath a fabulous blue jacaranda, or an orange or lemon tree, or alongside masses of intoxicatingly aromatic night blooming jasmine. Then we’d sit back, gaze up at the starry sky and wait for the engine to cool. It was a ravishing feast for the senses and a quick and sure route to Tom’s heart. He was always a very fond and affectionate man, and he was especially fond of me, in spite of his determination to desert me for another woman. On that long drive home, I was just the person to make him feel good and loved. We laughed, we snuggled, we dreamed, and we basked in the dark, delicious paradise that surrounded us.

It was always hard to get Tom to stop and smell the roses or the night blooming jasmine, but somebody was watching out for both of us and had gorgeously trapped him with the woman whose charms he couldn’t resist. Yes, with the help of the spirit world, I reestablished my firm grip on his earthy libido on that very romantic night. I’ll never forget our slow jeep ride to Los Feliz. It was a magical night, one I will always cherish. Whatever he thought of me and whatever plans he was making for his future, he couldn’t stop himself from enjoying being with me.

About four hours later, just as dawn was turning the sky pearly gray, we arrived back at our little apartment, safe and happy. Knowing how our lives are orchestrated by great powers in the spirit world and how they strive to help us satisfy our heart’s desires, I think the threat to our happiness that night was very dire indeed. Having thrown away everything else, Tom was on the verge of abandoning our marriage and my love. But Love seems to draw power to itself from the great animating force of the universe, or God, if you prefer. We were saved, because, no matter what, I loved Tom. And on that fateful Fourth of July, whatever and whoever Tom might think he wanted, he was trapped with his true love in a little bit of heaven on Sunset Boulevard.

Tom’s engine overheating? Pretty funny. Coincidence? I don't think so. Proof that God has a very active sense of humor. The Creator very certainly smiles on love. Someone in the spirit world was working very hard to keep Tom and me together. Within a year, I was pregnant, something we both really wanted.

This is the strangest afterlife story you will ever read. A man with a divided soul, one in hell and one in heaven, came back to confess the truth and expose how the devil ruined his life. A must read for anyone struggling to reconcile sin and mental illness.