Grace in Disguise

This is the actual statement made
by the parents of the deceased.

By Tendar Tsering | Sept. 15, 2017 |

Tom was workaholic and friendly with everyone at his work. It was Tom, who would serve coffee, or make print copies for everyone. Every time. Every day. He was like that as long as he could remember. But in recent years, things had changed, and so was Tom. 

 Layoff after layoff, Tom was merely a layoff survivor. He was struggling with increased workloads and heightened stress— often doing the works of three or four people. He was badly waiting for his retirement. He had a long list of to do things after retirement. He wanted to volunteer at the local church. He wanted to tour Europe. He wanted to spend time with his grand children, and his ex-wives. His list went on and on.

And yesterday, he finally retired. He was deliriously delighted to inform the news to his friends in the town. As soon as, he passed the highway, and entered into the much quiet, and familiar street, he canceled the GPS on his cell phone, and tried to pick up the phone from behind the steering wheel. He slipped the phone, and as he tried to catch the falling phone, his hand momentarily struck in the steering wheel, and he lost control of the car, and he landed his car in someone else’s driveway. He heard a thud as if his car hit a deer, or garbage can. He stopped the car, and got out, but saw nothing. He looked around, and got back in the car again. As he drove away from the driveway, he saw a child around two years old totally crushed, and bleeding. Tom was motionless. Senseless. Absolute numbness. After seconds, his senses came back, and his hands were shivering. He tried to open the car door and get out, then, he saw a woman in late 40s screaming and running from the house. Tom stood still in the car, sweating and shacking.

Within minutes, the woman held up the toddler in her arms, shouting, “Ngi bhu, ngi bhu.” Soon, a man in early forties, apparently the father of the child came out of the house, and the two rushed the child to the nearest hospital. Tom was still in his car, and still in the family’s driveway.

After some time, Tom called his son, and explained what happened to him. Tom told his son to come and pick him up as his hands were still shacking. Shortly, Tom’s son and his wife came. Tom and his son headed to the local police station to confess the fatal crush. And Tom’s daughter in law drove Tom’s car back to their house.

Tom spent the night at the police station confessing and cooperating with the officers. Early this morning, Tom received a letter from the parents of the toddler. In the letter, it was written like this, “Our son, our two year old son, Tenzin is no more with us, because of the tragic accident, and as this is as unbearable as, is an opportunity for us to practice compassion and understand that we all are here for momentarily. So, we forgive you, and hope, you will forgive yourself, and everyone will take this as a lesson to drive carefully in the future.”

Tom was speechless. So were the police officers. And officers drove Tom back to his house.

 NOTE:   The above piece is a fictional account in the characterization of the driver who crushed a Tibetan toddler to death in Florida this week. And the writer has no knowledge of the actual car accident rather than moved to tears by the act of the parents of the child, who publicly announced to forgive the man responsible for their child’s death.