$14 Vision

Hitch-hiking is tough business, at best. Hitch-hiking with next to no money is tougher still, requiring a philosophical outlook and a spiritual faith. In 1998, I hitch-hiked from the City of Arcata, in Humboldt County, California to Maine to visit my family. I had four dollars and change in my pocket. On the first day of the journey, having made it part-way through Humboldt County, south on Highway 101, standing along the side of the road, I suddenly had a vision. I saw a patch of ground. It was grassy, with a particular-looking type of grass. In the grass was a rolled-up $10 bill. While the grass was very clear to see, the $10 bill was a bit blurry. There were four one-dollar bills rolled up within the $10 bill. I couldn’t see them, but I knew this with certainty. Then the vision ended as suddenly as it had begun. For the next few days, as I slowly made my way across the country, every time I was dropped off from a ride, I looked at the ground to see if this was the grass from the vision. In every place, the grass looked different, so I didn’t look for the money. After a few days, I was dropped off at a spot in southern Indiana. There it was! This was the spot! This was the grass from my vision! But who really believes in visions? I didn’t. It must have been just some weird mind glitch that I experienced. So I ignored it. This was an area with lots of traffic – a good place for a hitch-hiker to stand, with plenty of room for a car to pull over, but no-one did. Hour after hour went by. I got caught in two downpours. I walked to a truck stop and found a truck driver who promised he would give me a ride if I went back to the highway entrance and waited for him there. He never showed up. Eventually, six hours passed. This was, by far, the longest I had waited for a ride during this trip. I wondered what could be wrong? Finally, I decided that the problem was that I wasn’t honoring the vision. So I went back to the exact spot where I had seen the grass that had been in my vision. I vowed to find the money and started to look around through the grass. Within about three minutes, I found the money. The rolled-up $10 bill was blurry because it had apparently survived a winter and had sand from the snow plows partially covering it. I picked it up and unrolled it and inside were the four one-dollar bills! I put the money in my pocket and went back to hitch-hiking. I got a ride out of there within twenty minutes.

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