This is the beginning of the Pickle Chronicles. Hillary and I will be interviewing people and sharing their "Fork In The Road" moments. Also life stories that we feel will uplift you and help you to have the desire to move forward and to progress to the best we can be. When we see we are not alone, we gain strength. We pray you will find this blog an uplift. Sincerly, Robin and Hillary
We begin with a portion of my own "Fork In The Road" moment. You asked me to share first, and I hope you find it an uplift.
In 1977 I was not an active member of the church, in fact I was probably as far from a Latter Day Saint as you can be. During this time I met and married my husband Glenn. At 6' 6" he was a very formidable man to look at. When we met he was the Vice President of a California corporation called Color Glow, which was an auto body chain. He was used to having everything his way and no one went against his will, not even me. I once saw him dump to full grown men in a trash can and shut the lid on it. They did not attempt to get out, he was mad!
I was 21 when we married and we had been engaged for 2 years. I had been on my own for 4 years already, so in the beginning I was perfectly content to have him be in charge, and to be taken care of for a change.
But shortly into this arrangement my own natural desire to be in charge of myself began to reassert itself. But Glenn was not about to let go of the reins after having been given carte blanche. So for the next 5 years we fought daily, when we went to dinner at his Mom's she always sat us at opposite ends of the table so we wouldn't ruin every one's dinner. At some point I cried everyday, in matter of fact I cried everyday for the first 15 years of marriage. In the fifth year I had a spiritual rebirth. So I no longer fought with him but he fought with me all the same.
One Friday night we were in the car fighting like always, it was a particularly bad fight. I of course was crying and I was talking to Father in Heaven, asking Him to take my life. Glenn drove over to my parents house, and went inside. I never fought with him in front of my family, and he thought the fight would be over. I refused to go inside.
I walked to the end of my parents street and stood in the road talking to God. I told Him I was as good as I would ever be, I couldn't change my life and would He please just take me home to be where I would be. As I was standing there a car came around the corner, it was a Mustang with a young driver who had been driving crazy to scare the girls in his car! But when he saw me it was too late to stop. Here was my chance for the misery to be over...
It was truly in slow motion, I could see his face and the fear on it. He could not stop the car in time, hitting me would have ruined his life forever... In a split second I stepped back out of the way, I choose to live. As the car went screeching past me I realized, I did want to live and somehow I had to make the changes needed to become who God knew I could be. This was the beginning of my spiritual rebirth...
There is a second chapter to this fork in the road, I will share it at another time. This was a drain on my strength today.
