January 3, 2003

First Friday Snowstorm

I always look forward to Friday, not so much that it is the end of the work week but going to St. Mary’s for the weekly rosary is very special to me. When I finished my work that day I left to go to Emmitsburg and when I started my truck the clock on the dash was 4:13. It was raining pretty hard. When I arrived at Wal Mart in Leesburg to pick up Ted the time was 5:33. When we arrived at entrance of the Grotto the odometer was 1.3. Just at that point the rain was starting to turn to snow. We rode by St. Joseph’s which is always our first stop and arrived at 6:33. There was a sign posted on the door and I got out of the truck to read it. It said “Because of predicted bad weather the First Friday Holy Hour and all night Adoration is canceled.” At the very instant I finished reading the sign I felt suddenly compelled to look at my watch and it said 6:33:59, the last second.

Ted and I started driving to St. Mary’s and the snow was getting harder. We turned on Tract Rd. and at the very instant we crossed the state line into Pennsylvania the snow changed into a blizzard. There was several inches of snow on the ground and it was snowing so hard you could hardly see. We knew there would be no rosary at St. Mary’s tonight but we continued to drive anyway. When we arrived at St. Mary’s the church was dark and nobody was there. We drove back to Emmitsburg on the main road because Tract Rd. was very bad. Traffic was moving at about 20 mph because of the road conditions. When we crossed the state line back into Maryland the snow became a snow and rain mix and the roads were just wet. I said to Ted that I would still like to pray our Friday night rosary sitting in the truck at St. Joseph’s. Ted said that was fine with him. We arrived back at St. Joseph’s at exactly 7:13 and started our rosary. Just as we completed the 4th Sorrowful, Karen Majors pulled up and was going to Adoration. We told her that the church was closed because of the weather. Karen was very disappointed.

We talked for a few minutes and then invited her to get in the truck and finish the rosary with us. She did. When we finished we said good by to Karen and we left. The time was 8:33. When I arrived home there was a message on the answering machine from Dolly Kowalic saying there would not be a rosary tonight because of the snow. I am glad we missed the message.