Freque Factory - Alabama, Last Time Around

Freque Factory

Alabama - Last Time around

  Finally it was time to move back to Huntsville.  Marie had rented our apartment and had moved in.  I was packed and leaving in a few days.  In a phone conversation Marie casually mentions that she has started dating someone and he is moving in with her.  She promises me that nothing will change...

   When I got there I realized that Marie and her new boy friend were in that in-their-own-world stage.  I barely existed to them.  Not what I was expecting.

   I did get a job pretty quickly.  Fast food again.  This time for a place called the Rocket Inn.  Hamburgers, etc. and soft serve ice cream.  I mostly worked closing shifts, so I got to clean out the ice cream machine most nights.  It was far enough away that I couldn't walk home that late at night.  I was able to get rides, but I started getting pressure quickly to arrange other transportation.

  I was taking baby steps spiritually.  I stayed away from Lincoln Street (mostly because it was too far to walk).  Mostly I stayed at home when I wasn't working.  Since Marie was busy I used the time to pray and read the Bible.  As a Roman Catholic I hadn't been encouraged to read the Bible and I was finding it really interesting.  What Jesus talked about was a really radical lifestyle!

   Soon after I came back to Huntsville I started having the same dream.  Marie and I were in her car driving some place.  It was a black car that she didn't currently own.  Suddenly we were in an accident.  My side of the car was hit.

   Marie got engaged after about a month of me being there.  The wedding would be in about 6 months.  I could stay living with them for now, but I'd have to find someplace else to live before the wedding.  This was not happy news.  Now what do I do?  I don't have the money to move.

   When it rains it pours.  I got laid off my job.  And like before, I wasn't able to find another job.  I started really praying.  What to do?  I was still having the black car dreams, only they were getting more detailed.  In the accident I was killed and Marie was fine.  It was not fun living through my own death most nights.  More prayer-why this dream and could it please go away?

   And then one day Marie came home with a new car.  Her uncle had gotten a new one and had given her his old one.  It was the black car of my dream!  It was clear to me that the dreams had been a warning.  Every time I rode in that car I would be risking my life.  Could I continue to live in Huntsville with no job and soon to be no place to live?  I'd like to live, thank you.  I called my mom and flew back home to Southern California.  I had no job there either, but at least I'd have a place to live.

  I started a new life back home, but I didn't forget my friends in Huntsville.  I called Marie on the day she was supposed to be getting married.  By then the couple had broken up.  I was glad about that.  We didn't talk long.  She was getting ready to go buy a new car.  Did I remember that black car she had?  On the road out to her home town she was hit by another car.  She was fine, but the passenger side was wrecked.  She was glad no one was with her at the time...