When Detours Save Lives: Three Moments That Changed Our Family’s Course
Life rarely announces its turning points with clarity. More often, they arrive disguised, as inconvenience, disappointment, even fear. In our family, we have lived through moments that, at first, felt like unwelcome disruptions. Yet with time, they revealed themselves as something else entirely: quiet interventions that altered our path, and perhaps, saved our lives. Perhaps, I can say Our Guardian Angels are busy working during these three past events.
1. A Wife’s Ultimatum and a Life Saved
Yes, there were occasional signs, bloating, acid reflux but nothing, in my mind, worth slowing down for. Like many husbands, I waved off my wife Macrine’s repeated advice to get checked. I was “too busy.” I was “fine.” Until I wasn’t given a choice.
Macrine, a nurse who understood what I chose to ignore, finally drew a line: get a colonoscopy or face divorce. It was not anger speaking. It was urgency wrapped in love.
Reluctantly, I went. The diagnosis came back: Stage 1 colon cancer.
My surgeon removed it successfully. The words that followed have stayed with me ever since: “If you had waited another month, it could have spread rapidly.”
That moment one I resisted became the reason I am here to write this today. What felt like pressure…was protection.
2. The Assignment That Took Her Away—from Danger
Years later, my daughter Ditas would experience her own unexpected detour, one that she initially viewed as a setback.
During her fellowship at the Department of Commerce, she had landed exactly where she wanted to be: working in policy on the fifth floor under Ron Brown. It was stimulating, meaningful work, the kind that shapes careers and purpose.
Then, after twelve months, she was reassigned back to her sponsoring agency, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Back to budget work. Away from policy. Away from where she felt she belonged.
She was devastated. It felt like a step backward. A door closing. But life was quietly redirecting her.
On April 3, 1996, the plane carrying Secretary Brown and his delegation crashed in Croatia, a tragedy now remembered as the 1996 Croatia USAF CT-43 crash. Everyone on board perished.
Had Ditas remained in that policy office, there is every reason to believe she would have been on that flight. The reassignment she mourned became the very thing that kept her alive.
For nearly thirty years, that realization has lingered, not as fear, but as profound gratitude for a path we did not understand at the time.
3. A Collision That Revealed the Unseen
And now, in the present day, another moment, still unfolding.
Just last month, A relative was involved in a serious car accident. A driver ran a red light and struck her vehicle on the passenger side. The car was totaled. She spent hours in the emergency room. Her air bags functioned and she was able to call 911.
At first, it seemed like an unfortunate, isolated event.
But in the days that followed, something didn’t feel right. Chest pain prompted her to return to the hospital. This time, doctors conducted more thorough testing.
They found a large mass on her pancreas.
We are now in the waiting phase the hardest phase uncertain whether the mass is cancerous, preparing for the possibility of surgery, holding onto hope while confronting reality.
And yet, even in this moment of fear, there is a sobering truth:
Without that accident, the mass might have gone undetected-until it was too late.
Reflections: When Life Interrupts, Pay Attention
Three moments. Three disruptions. Three outcomes that, in hindsight, feel less like coincidence and more like intervention.
- A wife’s insistence that led to early cancer detection
- A career detour that prevented a fatal tragedy
- A sudden accident that uncovered a hidden illness
None of these felt like blessings at the time. They felt inconvenient. Unfair. Frightening.
But life does not always protect us in ways we recognize immediately. Sometimes it nudges. Sometimes it blocks. Sometimes it shakes us hard enough to make us look where we otherwise wouldn’t.
As I reflect on these experiences, one lesson rises above all:
Listen, to the people who love you, to the signals your body sends, and even to the unexpected turns life places in your path.
Because sometimes, what appears to be a disruption…is actually a rescue.
I sometimes wonder, are these examples, the work of our Guardian Angels?
Lastly, My Two Quotes of the Day:
“The more you love yourself, the less nonsense you will tolerate.”
Anonymous
“Take time to do what makes your soul happy.”
Anonymous
