Literary / Arts
The Lord Will Provide … A Ride …
David Jure, Victoria
Volume 28 Issue 4, 5 & 6 | Posted: June 30, 2014
You have to have real faith and chutzpah to hitchhike these days.
Several years ago I saw a young bloke on the side of the road at the Trans-Canada with a sign that said, “I won’t kill you.” I hitched much of Canada in the old days and had many hair-raising adventures, and, dressing in a white dinner jacket, got picked up almost immediately.
Bible-thumpers loved to pick me up, and thump they did and I would give as good as I got in the faith department but really it was apples and oranges.
You have to have real faith and chutzpah to hitchhike these days.
Several years ago I saw a young bloke on the side of the road at the Trans-Canada with a sign that said, “I won’t kill you.” I hitched much of Canada in the old days and had many hair-raising adventures, and, dressing in a white dinner jacket, got picked up almost immediately.
Bible-thumpers loved to pick me up, and thump they did and I would give as good as I got in the faith department but really it was apples and oranges.
Once, outside of Winnipeg I had occasion to play a funny prank on two earnest young Jehovah’s Witnesses, who seemed to question everything about me. When it came to the subject of the “crucifiction” they just would not let it go. So finally I reached into my bag and pulled out two goblets and proceeded to play the Christ role, including showing them the mark on my foot where the nail had been driven in. They got really angry and let me off posthaste and then sat in the truck a few feet away debating God knows what. I was afraid they were going to do me an injury.
I got picked up by my fair share of nut cases. One man, whose hands were shaking at the wheel, told me he had just been released from the Napa Valley State mental institution. I’ll never forget coming back from California, the kind Jewish family who took a real shine to me and we argued religion for miles and then they put me up in a spare room in their mansion on the coast.
One grievous night near Star City I was literally on my knees praying for a ride when a nice hippy man picked me up and took me to his large abode and played music for me and introduced me to his wife and bought me breakfast in the morning.
I really took terrible chances in those days but the danger was easy to assimilate because I had the Lord by my side. Now in two thousand fourteen, I look back on those days without abode, with a narrow sense of purpose and the wind on my shoulder and at my back and I somewhat resent my prostate condition, the city noise, the paying of bills, the hose cleaning etc. and secretly wish I was out on the highway again with the sun going down and my head and thumb held high.
David Jure, Victoria