What other explanation is there? I open up the newspaper this morning, and there in the Saturday “Auto” section is a glowing review of the Mini-Cooper. I got to drive one of the original Mini-Coopers exactly one time, circa 1967, when a college friend much more knowledgeable about cars than I urged me to test drive one, as an alternative to a VW bug that I was thinking of buying. That test drive is still fresh in my mind, or, at least, as fresh as any experience from the 60s can be, for reasons that should be obvious, but which are irrelevant to the subject at hand. Which is, what a Cool Car the Mini-Cooper was, and now once again is, in its recently reincarnated form (an apt term that, now that I think about it, reincarnated).
Anyway, until today I have seen only one Mini-Cooper on the streets of Salem, Then, waiting for a light to change at the corner of Court Street and Commercial this morning, walking to my martial arts class, I espy a yellow Mini-Cooper with a white top tooling down Commercial. I ogle it (though that color scheme doesn't do much for me). I go to the class. After class, I walk back along Court Street, heading for my boring Volvo station wagon. And there, going down Court Street this time, but at the very same intersection I saw it two hours before, is the yellow Mini-Cooper with a white top. Clearly, a message from God. I am destined to have a Mini-Cooper. And not just any old Mini-Cooper, because God is good, and God is generous. And because I really want a supercharged Mini-Cooper, if I am to have one at all. Which I am, because God wants it so.
Now, the only fly in the ointment in this (to my mind) ironclad theological conclusion, came, not surprisingly, from my wife. When I got home and pointed out the amazing unlikelihood that I would read about the Mini-Cooper in the Statesman-Journal today, then see the same Mini-Cooper pass before me not once, but twice, that same morning, when I had seen but one in the months and months before, so obviously God was sending me a message that it was right and good that, one day, a Mini-Cooper sit in our carport, she said: "How do you know it is God sending the message?"
Well, the nerve! How do I know?!! Because I know! However, I suppose she does have a point. "Doesn't God want us to lessen our worldly desires," asked Laurel irritatingly, "rather than add to them?" Hmmmm. So Laurel had the gall to suggest that some lesser divinity, or perhaps even the Dark One, or chance, led me to see three Mini-Cooper Signs in a single morning. Well, everyone is welcome to her own opinion, as ridiculous as it is. I still feel that God is calling me to become a Mini-Cooper owner, And because I believe in grace, and because I don't have the $20, 000 or so it takes to buy a Mini-Cooper S, the supercharged version (plus the bribe money to get a dealer to put you at the top of the lengthy would-be buyer waiting list), I am publicly issuing this challenge to God through my humble weblog.
"God, there are those who do not believe in you. One is my wife, because she doubts the blessed signs that appear to We Who Believe. But do not punish her. Rather, reward me for my faith. Lord, I know you work in mysterious ways, so I will not tell you how to get me driving a Mini-Cooper S, with the navigation system, Tiptronic transmission because I'm lazy (but the 6-speed is acceptable), racing green with a black top, or anything on top but the British flag option. I leave this In Your Hands. God, show my wife, and the doubters who read HinesSight, that You are Real. Get me a Mini-Cooper, and I shall believe, and sing your praises to all who stop to admire my new ever-so-cool wheels. Thank you in advance for your boundless generosity and grace, Brian."
I'll keep you posted on how things turn out. (Note to the Mini-Cooper public relations department: wouldn't this be a great human interest story, when I wake up one morning, and a Mini-Cooper S is sitting in my garage? Email me, and we'll work out the details).
Comments