It’s happened only a handful of times in my lifetime. It’s happened for family members, it’s happened for an acquaintance, it’s happened for a stranger that I would see on a daily basis from a distance, and now it’s happened for a location, which I never anticipated possible.

First, you sense a strange physical sensation, it’s very subtle, and then the voice says, “Look”, and so you do. And then it says, “Look again”. And you can’t help turning to stare with morbid intensity and fascination at the individual in question. You watch as they walk past you, drive past you, going about their business in total obliviousness. It feels like a pivotal life-changing moment. And it is, for them.

They all leave an indelible impression, but there are some who stand out more in my mind than others…two family members; the young man whom I hardly knew at a party; there was the total stranger I would meet at the same time everyday as we drove across the overpass; and finally, there was not an individual, but a location.

What does this strange phenomenon herald?

Death.

The man in the small green pickup on the overpass still haunts me. I drive this route everyday, this location where one day when we meet, everything seems to start moving in slow motion, and the voice says, “Look”. And I do. And it says, “Look again”. And I do, with that strange fixated intensity; I can’t stop looking. I really look at the driver for the first time, seeing details, as we’re both moving in opposite directions, but in that strange slow motion.

I see a young man in his late 20s or early 30s. I see the red baseball cap and the soft brown hair around the edges of it. I see the thick lensed black-framed glasses and the white t-shirt. I see his hands on the steering wheel and the look of concentration on his face. I look at him until we’ve passed, and then I watch his vehicle in my rear-view mirror until he disappears over the hill.

I have never spoken about this odd sense of premonition to anyone before, but I did after this experience. I told my daughters. I told them that I wish I knew who this young man was. I told them that if I knew where to find him, I might try to find enough courage to approach him, knowing I would sound like a crazy woman. I would tell him to take a different route, at least for a while. I told them that something awful was going to happen to this young man.

And it did.

One day, when we were outside in our front yard, the neighbor came home. He got out of his pickup and approached us, looking stunned. He said he’d just come home on the overpass, and that there had been a terrible accident. He said that a white van had plowed into several vehicles at a great speed. He said there were bodies and mangled vehicles everywhere, and it was the worst thing he’d ever seen. He was so pale, and breathless, and he looked dazed.

The over-pass is only a few blocks from our home.

We got in our vehicle and went to the edge of the highway east of our house, where we could see the overpass clearly, we were so close. And to my shock, there was the young man’s small green pickup, the driver’s door flung open, sitting cross-ways in the highway. When he was hit, he had been thrown from his pickup, at the top of the overpass, and had landed on the railroad tracks below. He was one of many casualties from this accident.

I think about him almost every time I drive over this hill.

Premonitions ~ Why do some people experience them? Is it odd that the experience is not necessarily a one-time thing, but something that can occur a number of times? What good is the ability to have a premonition if you can’t do anything to create a positive outcome? Where do premonitions come from? Who’s voice do I hear?